The Bodyguard 2: The Demon Behind the Angel
by FireStallion
Summary: Tony and JC have finally settled into as normal a life as they could possibly hope for. But with the threat from an unkown foe from JC's past, can their relationship hold? Or will the trail of lies and deception destroy them?
1. Chapter 1

**AN: For all those of you who have been waiting patiently, the sequal is finally here! If you haven't read the first one, you should probably go do that, or it is going to be very hard for you to read. I decided to post it today as my birthday gift to all of you who stuck with me to the end of the first one. I wanted to be able to post the next chapter sometime next week, but I'm gonna be at camp, so you guys are just going to have to wait until then. As always, I like hearing what you guys have to say, so let me know. All comments are most welcome. Now, on to the story!**

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The Bodyguard 2: The Demon Behind the Angel

**Chapter 1**

"Okay, Tony, three…two…one…jump."

As soon as he had the all clear, Tony jumped from the cargo plane and raced towards the ground, jets at full blast.

"Hey, Tony, while you're up there, try not to-" The voice was cut off by the loud clunk of fireworks exploding against his chest plate.

"Sorry, JC. What were you saying?" he asked.

"Try not to hit all the pyrotechnics on your way down would ya? The public doesn't want to see scratches all over the shiny red," she teased from her microphone on the ground.

"Don't worry. I'll be there soon enough," he said as he neared the target. Moments later he landed in a crouch, a loud clang resounding as the crowd went wild and sparks flew. Now it was show time. He pulled out all the stops giving the crowd a show to remember. With a little flare he stepped into the assembly line that had been set up beneath the stage and let it remove his armor to reveal that charming smile and a three piece suit. It hadn't been comfortable while in the armor, but it had made for a better show for the crowd.

"Oh, it's good to be back," he said as he motioned for the crowd to settle down so he could give his opening speech. Several stray shouts of glee from giddy women sounded while another man from the crowd suggested that he blow something up. Tony brushed it off with a joke that he'd already done that.

The crowd quelled its noise a bit more and let the great Tony Stark speak.

"Now, I'm not saying the world is enjoying its longest period of uninterrupted peace in years, because of me," he said none too modestly.

The crowd kept their cheered, but kept it down as they eagerly awaited what else was to come.

"I'm not say that from the ashes of captivity, never has there been a phoenix metaphor better personified in human history!"

The crowd cheered again even more loudly.

"I'm not saying that Uncle Sam can sit back on a lawn chair sipping an ice tea, because no one is man enough to go toe-to-toe with me on my best day!" he exulted, reaching his climax.

Tony drank in the crowds cheers for another moment before waving them to bring it down again.

"Please. No, please. It's not about me," he called. "Or you. It's not about us. It's about legacy. It's about what we choose to leave behind for future generations. And that is why, for the next year, and for the first time since 1974, the best and brightest men and women of nations and corporations the world over will pool their resources, share their collective vision to leave behind a brighter future."

The crowd went wild as they knew the grand finale was nearing.

"It's not about us. Therefore, what I am saying, if I'm saying anything..." Stark built to the finish, "is, welcome back... To The Stark Expo."

The crowd exploded again.

Tony let them cheer, let the crowd feed it's own cry, until finally, he signaled the FX department. "And now, from beyond the grave, to tell you what it's all about, my Dad, Howard Stark."

Tony bowed and the lights dropped down to nothing, as the huge movie screen behind him came to life, and started playing the promotional film from the 1974 Expo.

He stepped back behind the stage and met up with JC.

"Nice opening," she said with a grin. "A bit flashy, but it's you."

"Thanks, JC. Do you have the meter?" he asked, the irritation in his chest he had felt before the flight becoming more bothersome.

"Yeah, here," she replied, handing him the small device that originally was used for testing insulin levels in diabetics. "Are you okay?" she asked, worry etching on her brow.

"Yeah, it's nothing. Just a bit stuffy in the armor with the suit on," he said as he pricked his thumb on the tester.

Within seconds the read out said: Blood Toxicity: 8%

"It's kicking in again, isn't it?" JC said. She knew what was going on since she too had to deal with the same problem.

"Looks like it," he responded.

"Maybe you should call it a night then. You're looking a bit pale already," she said as she gathered up the tester and stored it away.

"No, I'm gonna finish this opening first. I've made it this far tonight, haven't I?" he said with that charming grin of his.

She looked back him skeptically before shaking her head at him. "What am I going to do with you?" she questioned as she straitened his bow tie.

"Keep me, I suppose. Isn't that what you always do?" he said and gave her a quick peck on the cheek as the film came to an end and headed back out. The rest of the opening passed by in a blur as Tony tried to ignore the irritation he felt in his chest. When he was finally allowed to change out of the suit into more comfortable clothing, Tony felt more than ready to finally go home.

He pushed through the mob, JC and Happy at the front keeping the worst og the fans away while he signed several pictures from girls and kids and did his best to keep the numerous slips of paper with phone numbers from making their way down the front of his shirt. He had managed to keep his relationship with JC a secret from the Press, but he still didn't want to upset her with over a dozen numbers from girls. JC had said she didn't mind for the sake of trying to keep appearances in public, but he knew her better than that.

When they had finally made it to his car, an attractive brunette was leaning against the front door. Tony tried not to pay her much attention as he told Happy that he would drive home.

"And you are?" Tony asked, trying to keep his tone light even though he really had no desire to deal with more flirty women.

"Marshal," she answered with a half innocent smile. Tony snuck a look over to JC as he took his spot in the driver seat and noticed she had that look in her eye, the pleasant I'm-going-to-kill-you-if-you-don't-walk-away-right-now look.

"Irish, huh? Where you from?"

"Bedford."

Tony grinned, trying to stay in character. "So, Marshal, what are you doing later?"

There was a change in her smile and Tony knew something was coming. "Delivering subpoenas," she answered and held out the envelope in question.

"Ouch," Happy commented as JC smirked her agreement. Now his evening had gone from irritating to downright awful.

"I don't like people handing me things," he said flatly.

"I'll take that," JC said as she took the letter and opened it.

"You are hereby ordered to appear before the Senate Armed Services Committee tomorrow morning at 9AM."

"You got a badge?" Tony quipped.

"He likes to see the badge," JC joined in.

The blonde pulled out a silver star Marshal badge. "Still like it?" she said with more than a little bite.

"How far away is Washington D.C.?" he asked Happy.

"About 250 miles," he answered.

"Hm," Tony mused.

"Keep to the speed limit, Mr. Stark, and, Happy, make sure he shows up on time with his pants on," JC said as she handed the letter to Happy.

"I will do my best, but you know how insistent he can be sometimes," Happy teased.

"Yeah, I know, but the Senate is kind of a big deal. I think it would be better if he was at least decent," she quipped.

"Ha ha ha," Tony said sarcastically. "You two are just so funny. You going down with Pepper then?" he asked JC.

"I figure Hogan can handle security while you're in court. I've got conferences all day tomorrow, so try not to do anything too stupid, because it will be on TV, and I will know about it," she said with her mischievous smirk. "Now, go, if you're going to be there on time."

"Just out of wild curiosity, when did you become the boss and me the employee?" Tony teased.

"Drive away, Mr. Stark, before I embarrass you in front of thousands of people," she said with her arms crossed over her chest.

He proceeded to stick his tongue out at her like a five year old before speeding off toward D.C. He wasn't really looking forward to the hearings, and it made him more uncomfortable knowing that JC wasn't going to be there. He figured the crowds couldn't be any worse than they usually were, but one could never be too careful now that the big secret was out.

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**AN: I know this one was short, but I promise the next couple will be longer to make up for it. And I'm sure not everything in here isn't exactly how it is in the movie. I don't exactly have any other refrences for it, so oh well for any errors. Don't forget to review. They always make my world go round ^-^**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

After an eventful morning in the Senate making Justin Hammer look like a total idiot and basically telling Senator Stern hell no, he couldn't have the armor, Tony was ready for a nice, quiet dinner with JC. He arrived sharply and seven and walked inside to see Darren in the kitchen cooking.

"Hey, Tony," Darren greeted before returning his attention to the stove. Whatever he was cooking was smelling pretty good.

"Hey, kid, how's it going?" he greeted.

"It's good. Dinner's almost ready," Darren answered.

"It smells great," Tony said as he took a seat at the bar. "Where's your mom? She told me to be here at seven. I was even on time for once."

"I know. Such a shocker," Darren quipped.

"Ha ha, smart aleck. So where is she?" Tony repeated.

"She was upstairs last I heard from her. She was working in her secret room and needed a shower," Darren reported.

"I see," Tony said. "What exactly is her secret room? You never have told me that."

"I don't even know," he admitted. "She had it built when I was like ten. I went off to camp one day, and when I came back, it was there. I thought it was just a gun safe or something like that, but she's never told me what it was. Whatever it is, it must be pretty big."

"What makes you say that?"

"You've never seen the door to it? Finger print lock, number code, and a voice print lock, that thing is probably more secure than Fort Knox. Still can't figure out what she's hiding in there. She always comes out in a sweat."

"I'm sure she's hiding a high tech gym in there. That's gotta be it," Tony teased.

"Yeah, 'cause everyone likes to work out in a vault."

They both laughed it all off for the moment, but now Tony was even more curious. He had heard Darren talk about JC's secret room before. Hell, after seven months with the woman, he knew quite a few of her dirty secrets, but that room was still a mystery.

"By the way, I saw your court hearing. That was possibly the most hilarious thing I ever saw. They way you humiliated Hammer was epic," Darren praised as he turned away from his cooking. "And when Senator Stern said f-"

"You will watch your language in my house," a voice said from the stair well.

Tony turned to see JC dressed in black sweat pants and tank top, her hair in an askew pony tail, leaning against the railing, arms across her chest. She obviously never made it to the shower.

"Hey there, gorgeous," Tony said, getting up to go hug her. She stopped him by putting a finger on his chest. He looked down a bit baffled. She cocked her eyebrow.

"What?" he asked. "Am I not allowed to say hello anymore?"

"I smell awful. I don't need you hugging me and smelling like my sweat all night," she responded with a smirk.

"When has sweat ever stopped me from hugging you?" he countered with a grin.

"Yes, well, tonight I'd prefer if only one of us smelled," she said and walked past him to the kitchen. In an instant he grabbed her from behind and lifted her off her feet as he nipped at her neck.

"No, Tony, stop!" she giggled as she struggled to get out of his grip.

"Only if I get to give you a real hug," he taunted.

"You are such a turd," she said, slapping his arm playfully.

"Is that a yes?"

"Would you at least put me down on the ground?"

He complied and set her back down without releasing his grip. She quelled her laughter and relaxed against his chest.

"You are a terrible person, you know that?" she said, tugging on his chin hairs.

"You've told me that before," he said as she pulled him in for a quick kiss.

"I'm still not happy with you," she and pushed away from him to check on dinner.

"Oh dear," he sighed. "What did I do?"

"This morning when I called you, I did tell you to behave yourself in court. I remember those words specifically. So do you want to explain what happened while you were in Washington?" she questioned.

He had to admit, he did see that one coming.

"I did behave. I didn't go off subject. I didn't mouth off. I answered every question truthfully, explained that the government can't just take my personal property. What part of that was misbehaving?" he said as he took his seat again.

"You know, as much as I enjoyed watching Justin Hammer be completely humiliated with that video, which was beautiful by the way, was it really necessary to hack into the system to post the video? And pushing Stern to cussing was a bit over the top, don't ya think?"

"I didn't tell him to cuss," he said innocently.

"You made a kissy face at the man when you left," she pointed out. "What did you think was going to happen?"

He looked away trying to think of an answer before staring back at her with as innocent of a face as he could muster. If her cocked brow was any indicator, she wasn't buying it.

"I'm beginning to think I can't leave you alone for five minutes. You always seem to get into trouble as soon as I turn my back. And you, young man," she said, turning to Darren, "know better than to even think of using foul language."

"Sorry, mom," Darren apologized and turned back to dinner which he removed from the stove.

It didn't take long for the tension of the evening to finally melt away as the three of them sat down to dinner and began talking of other things. In no time they were smiling and laughing at stories from throughout the week. For Tony it felt like they were almost a happy little family. Almost. Eventually the conversation turned to Darren.

"So, Darren, what's taking you so long to find a girlfriend?" Tony asked.

"Darren still thinks girls have cooties and should be avoided at all costs," JC answered. "Isn't that right, sweetie?"

Tony suppressed a grin as best he could, which miserably failed, as Darren's face went a shade of red.

"Mom!" he whined. "That is not true."

"Are you sure? I could have sworn that's what you told me last time I asked you."

"Mom, I was like six years old when I said that. I do happen to like girls," he pointed out.

"Well, this is a good thing. I was beginning to think it was your greatest secret," she teased as she picked up her plate and took it to the sink.

"Yeah? What about you? When are you going to tell Tony your big secret?" Darren countered.

"And what secret would that be?" JC asked as she washed her plate.

"You still haven't told him your real name, have you?" Darren said with a victorious grin.

"Hey, he's right. You never have told me what your initials stand for, JC," Tony said, now intrigued where the conversation was going.

"That's because I hate my name. There's a reason I only go by my initials," she said as she continued to clear the table of dirty dishes.

"How bad could it be? It's not something like Dorris or something like that. It couldn't possibly be that awful," Tony pressed. He had known her for almost two years and still he had no clue what her real name was.

"No, Tony, I'm not telling you my name."

"Please," he pleaded with his best puppy dog pouty face.

She turned and put her hands on the kitchen counter leaning towards him with a scrutinizing glare. She heaved a sigh before shaking her head in defeat.

"If I tell you what it is, will you at least promise not to laugh?"

"Cross my heart, hope to die," Tony said as he made an 'x' over his chest.

She heaved a sigh before quickly saying her name under her breath. He could barely make out any of the syllables of what she had just said.

"I'm sorry, but you're going to have to say that again. We couldn't hear you over here," Tony teased, cupping one hand over his ear for emphasis.

"All right, you turd. My name is Jadvyga Caiden. Are you happy now?" she said with a huff.

"Yadi what? Are you yanking my chain? That's not seriously your name," Tony quipped.

"Jadvyga Caiden is my real name, Tony. Jadvyga is Lithuanian," she explained. "And you," she said, pointing to Darren, "are grounded until you're thirty," she said in a mock serious tone.

"That's funny, because you don't look Lithuanian. Who decided to give you the most outlandish name in the world?"

JC rolled her eyes before answering, "My mother was Lithuanian and my father was American. She had wanted to name me and my brother Lithuanian names, but Dad said no with my brother. He wanted his kid to have a regular first name, but he promised mom that if they ever had a second kid, she could name it whatever she wanted. So, my brother got Caleb and I got Jadvyga. And yes, Tony, I do look Lithuanian."

"No, you don't. You look American."

"How many Lithuanian women do you know, exactly?" she countered.

"Okay, so I've never actually met one before," Tony admitted. "But you don't sound foreign," he pointed out.

"My mother was the only one with the accent. It wasn't like I was around enough Lithuanian people to really pick up a heavy accent. What little accent I had got lost when I went to college and the army. It's not that surprising."

"All right, all right, I give up. I get it. You, Lithuanian. Me, stupid American," Tony admitted with a sigh.

"It's okay, Tony,'' Darren said. "It happens to the best of us."

"You have homework to finish, Darren. Go upstairs and get it done," JC said and went back to the dishes.

"But it's not due until next week," Darren complained.

"Get it done now, and you can have more free time to do whatever you want. Don't argue with me."

"You just want me out of the room so you two can start sucking each other's faces off."

JC turned to him with an exasperated look on her face. "No, we're not. Go do your homework, now," she said, pointing to the stairs.

"Yes, ma'am," he grumbled and headed upstairs.

As soon as Darren was gone Tony walked up behind JC and put his arms around her waist so he wouldn't hinder her dish washing. He leaned his head against her shoulder and kissed her cheek. She barely reacted and continued with her scrubbing. Something was irritating her.

"You know I wasn't trying to be a jerk about your name, right?" he asked, hoping that wasn't what had set her off.

"I know," she said, still scrubbing.

"Talk to me. What's wrong?" he said, holding her tighter.

"Nothing's wrong, Tony," she huffed.

"You're a terrible liar, you know that?"

She set the dishes down and turned off the water before leaning against him, shutting her eyes and resting her head on his chest. Tony wasn't sure what was going on, but whatever it was had wiped her out, which didn't happen often. It was one of her most admirable traits to keep cool under pressure no matter what.

"Parent/teacher conferences were today," she finally said.

"Darren's a good student. Was it really that bad?" Tony questioned. Darren ranked number one in his class with plenty of honor classes to prove he deserved it. He wasn't a super genius like Tony, but he certainly had a lot of potential to become something great.

JC finally opened her eyes and stepped away from him so she could look at him while she talked.

"It started last year. With everything that happened in Afghanistan, he was becoming more detached. He got quiet, barely ever spoke in class, and teachers were getting worried. Things started to improve a little after we got back, so I didn't think too much of it and blamed it all on stress. He had been told that I was more than likely dead, for crying out loud," she explained.

"So, what happened?"

"Things have started to fall again. It was slow and subtle at first, I guess, but it's out of control. He used to be the one with all the answers in class, and now he won't even raise his hand. He just sits and doesn't say a word in any of his classes. And do you want to know the worst of it? He brought home an F on a test. Forty six out of one hundred questions," she said. "The worst he has ever done even on the crappiest of days is a B-. He never just fails a test or anything like that."

"What about his friends? I never see any over here, and he's always in the house. He does have friends that he hangs out with right? I mean, they could probably tell you better than anyone if something was wrong with him."

"He has friends, but he hardly has them over anymore. He always tells me that they're too busy with jobs and such. I don't even know if that's true or not anymore."

"Have you tried talking to him about it?" Tony suggested.

"I wouldn't even know where to start. Even if I did, he would just get defensive and tell me nothing. I have a good idea what it is, though."

"Yeah?"

"It all started when I went back to work for you and we…you know?"

He knew what she meant: ever since they had started dating six months ago. Tony had been under the impression that Darren was okay with it. Tony knew the kid, how ever large or small it might be, still had some reservations about him. But he didn't think it was anything as serious as slacking off in his classes.

"I understand. This is probably my fault."

"No, Tony, it's not your fault," she said, taking his hands in hers. "If anything, it's probably my fault. One minute we all think I despise you and would rather stab out your eyes, and the next, we're kissing and dating. Damn," she cursed, "I'm the mom. I'm supposed to know what the hell it all means. I don't know if he wants attention, or he's bored, or he wants a father figure that isn't you, or it's something else entirely. I just don't know."

She leaned against his chest and let him hold her.

"You are an awesome mom, JC. You've raised an amazing kid all by yourself, and you should be proud of it. But, you're right. He probably needs a man in his life, and I haven't exactly been the best example of father figure."

"That's not really your fault, you know? You barely had a father figure yourself when you were growing up," JC pointed out.

"I know, and that's what I'm afraid of with Darren," he said.

"What are you suggesting?" she asked, looking up at him.

"Maybe I could try talking to him about whatever it is that's going on," he suggested.

"Tony, no offense, but heart-to-heart talks with kids are not your forte."

"What are you talking about? I've talked with him before about stuff. It was very emotional."

"That was one time, and you could barely stand up from the beating Stane had given you," she pointed out.

"He told you about that, didn't he? And here I though private man talks were private," he said with a grin.

She smiled up at him before standing on her toes to give him a kiss. Tony hugged her closer as he reached up with one hand to cup her face. Her hands snaked up and wrapped around his neck, her fingers stroking and playing with his hair as she pulled him down closer. His hands began to wander down her body as he lost himself in the kiss. His fingers started playing with the hem of her shirt when she started to pull away from him.

"What is it?" he asked, confused as to why she was stopping now. They hadn't slept together yet, but he had still gone farther than the hem of her shirt without any complaints.

"It's nothing. This stupid thing has just been irritating tonight," she said, referring to the reactor.

"Did you change your core recently?" he asked. He'd already changed his today, which meant that JC probably needed to do hers pretty soon.

"No, I meant to. It's just in the right spot that I can't always reach it, so I kinda ignore it more than I should."

"Why don't you ask Darren to help you then?"

"Because I don't need him worrying or something like that."

"Fine. Let me see it," Tony said with a sigh. She turned and lifted up her shirt to expose the device. "Where are your spare cores?" he asked as he removed the device.

She reached over to the sink and pulled down the door beneath the sink that usually held the dish scrubbers and pulled out a small case.

"Oh, yes, that's where I'd put my spares. They go so well with the sponges," he said sarcastically as he changed out the burnt out palladium core with a fresh one.

"It's better than with your cigar box. How long do you think you can keep that hidden from Pepper?" she asked.

"I'm not hiding it from Pepper."

"Are to."

"Am not."

"Are to."

"Am not."

"Am not."

"Are to." He glared at her when he realized what he had just said. She turned and grinned triumphantly at him. "You tricked me," he said, pointing at her.

"Me? Trick you? I can't believe you'd even suggest something like that," she said, feigning innocence.

He looked at her mischievously for a moment. She noticed the look in his eye and immediately reacted, pulling away as quickly as possible, but it was already too late. He grabbed her up and began tickling her sides. She kicked and squealed and beat against his arms demanding to be released.

"Do you yield?" he said as he continued his attack.

"I give. I give," she conceded, and he stopped.

"It's hard to do homework with you two yahoos making so much noise down there," Darren called from his room.

They both laughed at themselves before finally settling down again.

"I should go home now. Big day tomorrow," Tony said and headed for the door with JC right behind him. "Bring your boxing gear tomorrow."

"What's the big occasion?"

"Oh, nothing too big," he said opening the door, preparing to run for the car. "Just, you know, your basic handing-over-a-company papers. See you in the morning," he said quickly, giving her a peck on the cheek and shut the door behind him before she could question him. He knew the probability of her chasing after him was low, but she had done it before, so he wasn't going to take any chances. He didn't feel like explaining the entire reasoning behind him signing over the company. She had enough to worry about at that moment.

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**AN: So here's the next chapter. I made sure that it was longer since the last one was pretty short and that I was gone. THanks to those of you who have left reviews and have been reading the story. You guys are awesome! You know what your job is now. Let me know what you think, and hopefully I'll post the third one next week if I remember. College starts soon, so I'm gonna do my best to keep this one updated a little more regularly than the last one.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

The next morning Tony got dressed in his workout sweats and went to the kitchen to make up a bottle of his "favorite" chlorophyll beverage. Originally the chlorophyll was enough to counteract the blood poisoning from the palladium, but it was kicking back up again, and the chlorophyll was becoming less effective. Now, he was taking it in larger amounts just to keep up with the rate of the poisoning. He was up to over half a gallon a day now, and every ounce of it was horrid. He had recommended that JC drink just as much of it every day, but she insisted otherwise. The suit was accelerating his poisoning, so she figured that she would be okay on a lower dosage. He didn't agree with the reasoning, but with his levels at 14% and hers still at a low 2%, it was hard to convince her otherwise, and there was no way he could force her to drink the green muck.

Happy and Pepper showed up at around eight, Pepper was already hard at work running his company, as usual. She was still skeptical about his real reason for handing over the company to her, but he had managed to appease her with some line of crap that she hardly believed but didn't question. Honestly, he had no solution to the reactor problem. With the poisoning becoming more obvious on his chest by the day, he knew it was only a matter of time before it finally killed him. There was no other element or even combinations of elements that could conquer the same task of the palladium. With that knowledge in mind, he wanted the company to be taken care of, and he wasn't about to leave it to just any numb nut board member that would simply turn it back into weapons productions. He knew Pepper would respect his wishes to keep weapons out of the mix and keep the company running smoothly. How she would handle with the Press? That was another story entirely.

JC didn't show up until almost nine. She used to be there at six o'clock every morning until Tony asked her not to. He was never even awake until at least seven, if even that on most days, so he told her to come later, spend some time with Darren if she needed it, or just get some extra sleep. Back when she was still recovering from her shoulder injury from the fight with Stane, she had really needed the extra sleep. Even after seven months it still gave her some discomfort from time to time, but it was getting better. She still had to take it easy though. The muscles in her shoulder had sustained some tearing, and if she wasn't careful during the first year, there was a possibility she would re-tear the muscle, and it would become permanent.

When she came in, it was hard to say whether she looked upset or not. She didn't look 100% happy, but she didn't look like she was about to bite his head off either. She was dressed up in her sweats already and out on her boxing gloves and entered the regulation sized boxing ring that Tony had installed into his living room. Tony had already been working with Happy for awhile and was ready to take a few minute's break.

"Morning, JC," happy greeted.

"Hey, Happy," she said with a small smile. "You ready to get beat?"

"In your dreams," he taunted back. So far the score was 6-5 in JC's favor, and Happy was not going to rest until he had reclaimed his title as King of the Ring. Tony usually lost to both of them, so he chose not to even be part of their little competition, but he did enjoy watching the two of them, especially the smack talk.

"Let's not forget who demolished you last time. Two rounds in, you were down. What makes you think you have any chance of winning today?"

"Because, you were being sneaky last time, okay? You took a lucky shot. I'm not gonna make it so easy for you this time. I'll have you down in less than four rounds."

"You've gotta make it past round two first, buddy. Tony, step back. Wouldn't want to accidentally hit your pretty face," JC teased.

"Ha ha ha, you are not funny," Tony said as he took several drinks from his bottle and rolled out of the ring.

"I thought it was funny. What about you, Happy?"

"Just hysterical. Are we gonna talk, or are we gonna box?" Happy said, anxious to get going.

With that they went at each other, jabbing and dodging each other's hits. Even though Happy hadn't been in a real boxing match in quite a few years he was still a foe to be reckoned with. He had knocked Tony on his ass enough times to prove he still knew what he was doing, but watching him and JC fight was something else. Her footwork was quick and precise giving her the opportunity to land more hits to make up for her lack of hitting power. Happy's footwork was just as good, but definitely not as fast and he certainly had more power behind every punch. Essentially they followed the rules of the sport with one addition: JC's shoulder was off limits. It was surprising how violent the two would get during their fights. One time JC had come close to break Happy's nose, and Happy had nearly broken her jaw, but somehow it never seemed to impede their friendship. They still joked around, went out for drinks together and had a good time together in general. One could hardly tell they were willing to beat each other to hell at a moment's notice.

Six long rounds later Happy was on his back, sweat covering his body as he tried to slow his ragged breathing.

"Good round, Happy," JC breathed as she knelt down beside him, her body equally covered in sweat. "I thought you were gonna nail me with that last hit."

"I was hoping you would go down. You usually don't take those hits so well," he groaned as he tried to pull himself up into a sitting position.

"You must be getting soft in me then. Hardly felt a thing," she said with a smirk.

"You wish. I had to hold back on that one. I was about bash your shoulder with that one."

"Well, don't hold back next time. I'm a big girl. I know how to dodge a hit."

"You will do no such thing," Tony interjected, entering the ring. "Your shoulder is no condition for any unnecessary contact."

JC rolled her eyes at him and helped Happy up to his feet. After taking a water break, JC brought Happy his body pads and let him and Tony workout while she went to sit and talk with Pepper. Tony couldn't make out exactly what they were talking about, but he was sure it had something to do with him. It usually did. They were looking over papers and JC was pointing at something every now and then, nodding and shaking her head. He assumed it probably had something to do with him finding a new PA. JC had already called ahead and talked to Pepper about what was happening with the company and what was going to happen without her to run his life. Between Happy, Pepper and JC, they all had decided that Tony could not function without an assistant and should not even attempt doing so. Tony suggested that JC was more than capable of keeping him in line. JC responded by saying she was better at bashing skulls than keeping a schedule on some palm pilot.

As Tony continued throwing punches at Happy he tried mixing it up by adding in some mixed martial arts. Happy didn't much care for it and called it dirty boxing at best.

"You know, Happy, MMA is considered a legitimate fighting style," JC pointed out from the edge of the ring.

"It's called dirty boxing. It's been around for years," Happy defended. JC just laughed at them and shook her head.

A few minutes later the doorbell rang and Pepper brought in an attractive red head saying, "The notary is here."

Tony turned his full attention to woman. She was a bit shorter than Pepper with darker red hair, but she was definitely not what he expected of someone from the legal department. He was expecting some overweight old woman to come in and get his signature, but she couldn't have been more than twenty five years old and was quite attractive in her business suit and blouse. And he thought Pepper was the only one that made professional look sexy.

Happy took the moment to give him a quick jab to the back of the head, something about keeping your eyes on the opponent. Tony returned it with a quick jab to his stomach and returned his attention to notary.

"You got a name?" he asked.

"Natalie Rushman," she answered very professionally.

"Step right up and enter the church," he quipped, spreading the ropes apart for her. She looked skeptical, and Pepper tried to stop him, but Tony was not going to take no for an answer. He knew JC was probably going to slap him silly for it later.

"Hey, Happy, give her a quick lesson while I go talk business."

"Let me, Happy," JC offered, a mischievous grin on her face. Tony wasn't sure what she had planned, but he was sure that it probably was not going to be very pretty for Natalie. He watched for a moment as Happy backed off and JC began to question her on experience.

"So what do you think of her?" Tony asked Pepper.

"She's from legal, and I think she's a potential lawsuit waiting to happen," Pepper said as she looked over the papers.

"Hmm," Tony mused. "Natalie, how do you spell your last name?"

She spelled it out for him which he then entered into his touch screen table top. Several things popped up from qualifications to old modeling pictures.

"Look at this," he said, nudging Pepper. "She speaks French, Spanish, Italian and Latin. Latin? Who speaks Latin?"

"Nobody speaks Latin. It's a dead language," Pepper answered flatly. "You can read Latin and write Latin, but you don't speak it. Why are we discussing this?"

"You guys said I needed a new PA. She seems perfect." Tony paused to look up and see JC and Natalie throwing a few hits. It didn't seem too aggressive for now, so he paid them no mind.

"Tony, I already have several candidates lined up for the job."

"But look at this," he said, pulling up one of the modeling photos. "She modeled in Japan. You never modeled in Japan," he teased. Despite the provocative photos, Tony really thought she could do the job. Pepper was probably going to stick him with someone older and less attractive to keep him from even thinking of flirting. Though he would never go far with it, he still enjoyed flirting with Pepper since he knew she could take it and was willing to dish out the perfect amount of payback. Whoever she would hire to replace her would more than likely be too serious and not nearly as much fun.

As Tony was getting caught up in the excitement of finding a new PA and teasing Pepper at the same time, he heard JC let out a blood curdling scream of pain. He looked up in time to see JC on one knee clutching her right shoulder, the one that Stane had injured. Before either him or Happy could even think of moving to help her, she got a feral look in her eye and went after Natalie with an anger he had only seen her use in live combat. Natalie did well defending herself, obviously more experienced than she had probably led on, but JC looked like she was going for the kill. No fancy moves would be able to help Natalie.

Tony and Happy jumped into the ring at lightning speed and got between the two women, Happy trying to restrain JC.

"JC, stop it! It's over," Tony yelled.

"Get out of my way, Stark. I'm far from finished with her," JC growled as she struggled against Happy's arms that were locked around her waist.

"That's enough, JC," he said more forcefully, getting in her face.

She stopped and stared him down, a glare of death in her eyes. Her arm was twitching, obviously from pain. Tony wasn't sure what had set her off, but this was hardly acceptable, and he was not about to let her beat on an innocent woman. With a heavy breath JC conceded and shook off Happy. With a final cold stare at Tony and Natalie, she stormed off to the kitchen.

"I apologize, Mr. Stark," she said. "I shouldn't have done that."

"It's all right. It wasn't your fault. JC tends to take her competition a bit too seriously and forgets to control herself. Was there anything else you needed?" he said, wanting to get rid of her so he could take care of whatever JC's problem was.

"Just your impression," she said, picking up her folder and opening it to correct page. With his fingerprint she left, and he went off in search of JC. When he didn't find her in the kitchen he went for the living room. Sure enough she was on the couch with several ice packs on her shoulder.

"You want to explain what the hell that was?" he demanded.

"What?" she replied coldly.

"That fight? You were about to maim or otherwise kill that woman if given the chance. What were you thinking?"

"I don't like her. Anyone with those skills doesn't become a notary," she said with a sneer.

"So, because she's a notary who is able to defend herself is why you relentlessly attacked her? I don't buy it."

"Those aren't simple self defense moves she was doing. Those were complex, trained skills. I don't trust her."

"You sure this isn't about some issue of pride or something? Because whatever it is, drop it. She's not Happy who doesn't care if you break a few bones."

"This isn't pride," she spat, standing up, letting the ice bags fall to the floor. "This is my gut telling me there's something seriously wrong with that woman. She is hiding something."

"Is that so?" Tony questioned. "It sounds more like you're jealous of her just because I looked at her. You know I look at other women. I'm a normal man. It means nothing, and it's just an act."

"Please, Tony," she scoffed. "I'm not jealous of that bimbo. My gut says there's something wrong about her. I don't trust her. And don't tell me all of your ogling is just an act. You could barely take your eyes off her."

"So you were jealous," Tony countered.

"You are unbelievable," she huffed and sat back on the couch with her ice packs and stared off in the opposite direction of him.

Tony raked his fingers through his hair unsure of how to approach the problem. Something else was pissing her off, but she wasn't going to tell him. Sure, there was the problem with Darren, but that was hardly enough for something like this.

"Is your shoulder okay?" he finally asked, changing subject.

"I'll be fine to go to Monaco on Thursday. Don't worry about it," she said tersely. That wasn't what he had meant, but there was no point in arguing with her. She was in no mood to consider any type of reason. He only hoped that whatever it was would pass and soon.

JC ended up going home early that day on orders from Tony. There was nothing more she could do there, and with her shoulder irritating her the way it was, she needed to be at home with Darren who could make sure she took her pain pills, kept ice packs on her shoulder and didn't do anything stupid. Tony also hoped that it would give her some time to settle down and maybe have a civil conversation.

He called her house later that night, and after two rings Darren picked up.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Darren, it's Tony," he greeted.

"Hey, Tony, what's up?"

"Not much. How's your mom?"

"She's fine I guess. She's down in her room again. She's been down there since before I got home," Darren answered.

"What?" Tony exclaimed. "Why is she in there?"

"I don't know. Why? What's going on? Did something happen?"

Tony heaved a sigh of frustration before explaining, "She hurt her shoulder today while sparring. That was before she tried to kill the woman. Get her out of that room right now. No doubt she's been down there doing something to her shoulder that she shouldn't."

"Wait, what? She didn't say anything about that. What happened today to make her do that?"

"Hell if I know. She came in pissed off, so if there's something you know that I don't, I'd be delighted to hear it."

"She never said anything to me. I'll try to get her out, but there's not much I can do. She locks the door behind her. Thanks for letting me know. I'll do what I can to figure out what's going on and let you know."

"Okay. Thanks, Darren. Talk to you later."

With that they said good bye and hung up. That was as good as he was going to get, and he knew that. Whatever it was that was causing so much grief for JC, he would never know. For some absurd reason, she wanted to keep it a secret from both him and her son. Tony didn't understand it, but there was nothing he could do about it now. All he could hope for now was that she would be more willing to talk about by the time they left for Monaco. Pent up rage was not something good to have when you were up at about 20,000 feet, especially since JC like to carry gun.

* * *

**AN: As promised, here's the third chapter. Four will be up next week. Hope everyone is liking it so far. Anyways, you know what your job is now, so i won't remind you even though I've done it about twenty times now. :) **


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

Thursday morning rolled around, and Tony was still apprehensive about what JC would do. He had let her stay home the past two days since her shoulder was bothering her so much, but he hadn't heard from her since. He only hoped that her temper had cooled since the last time he had seen her, because he had something important to talk to her about, and he preferred to do it in the plane where there were no reporters that could possibly hear about it.

Pepper had made sure that he was at the airport on time since she had no desire to be late. She was the boss now, and she was gonna make as good of an impression as she could on the Press. JC, of course, was there early and with a lot of extra baggage. Darren got out of the car with her and hauled the luggage inside the plane.

"Since when does Darren come with you to carry the bags?" Tony asked as they boarded the plane.

"Since he's coming with us," she said flatly.

"Wait. Hang on just one second," Tony said, grabbing her by her left arm as they reached the top of the stairs to the plane. "What do you mean Darren is coming? Why is he coming?"

"He has a four day weekend from school, and I asked him to come," she answered with a glare.

"What? Are you afraid he's gonna throw a party or something while you're gone?"

"I know he won't. He's a bit more responsible than that."

"Then why is he coming? I like your son. You know I do, but this is another country we're going to. And there's going to be photographers and your son coming could cause a scene that reporters will blow up beyond all measures. Are you sure this is the best idea in the world?"

"Darren comes, or I don't," she said, staring him down.

Tony wasn't quite sure what to say. He didn't mind the boy coming, but he wasn't lying about the reporters. That and he wanted to be able to have some alone time to talk to her. He knew Pepper and Happy would give them the privacy they needed, but with more people on the plane, the private spots quickly diminished on the small, private jet. He didn't like the condition, but he let her go and boarded the plane.

Two hours passed with barely two words between them. Darren had done most of the talking for the first hour and eventually fell asleep. JC had brought a book and found it more interesting than anything else. Pepper was busy doing company business, and Happy had passed out half an hour in to the flight. Tony was left to twiddle his thumbs or stare at the TV that had been muted so Pepper could concentrate. Figuring this was probably the best chance he was going to get for a private moment with her, Tony stood and tapped JC on the shoulder.

"What?" she asked, her eyes glued to her book.

"Can I talk to you for a minute?" he asked.

"Speak."

"In private?" he insisted.

She looked up at him with an aggravated stare. "Does it have to be right now?"

"Yes," he said sternly.

She huffed before marking her page and set the book down in her seat. Tony then led her to the back of the plane to the bedroom and shut the door. JC sat down and blew out another breath.

"If you're trying to seduce me in an attempt to get on my good side or something, you're out of luck," she said.

"That's not why I asked you here. There's something important we need to talk about," he explained.

"Okay. Speak then."

Tony took in a breath before sitting down beside her. He hadn't been this nervous since the time in the cave when he asked her to put aside her hatred for him. That seemed like a walk in the park compared to what he was about to do.

_Okay, Tony, pull it together. You can do this. You _have_ to do this, _he thought to himself.

"You remember I told you that the poisoning was starting up again?" he began.

"Yeah," she answered. "What about it? The chlorophyll is keeping that under control, right?"

"It was. It's come back with a vengeance now. The chlorophyll is barely touching it now. With the suit use, the poisoning has been moving faster through my system," he explained.

"What are you trying to say, Tony?" she asked, concern beginning to fill her eyes.

"I'm saying…I'm saying that it may be a matter of weeks before the palladium poisoning reaches a lethal dose," he said, looking in her eyes. "I'm dying, JC…And so are you," he admitted. His heart was racing as he watched her features contort into shock then horror.

"How long would you estimate for mine?" she managed.

"Without suit use, maybe six months, maybe longer. It's hard to say for sure."

She turned away from him as the information was slowly digested. Her breathing became ragged as she buried her face in her hands and began to weep. He put an arm around her and drew her close. She let herself fall on his chest and clutched at his shirt. He cradled her head as he stroked her back soothingly.

"What am I supposed to do? What can I do?" she muttered. "What about Darren? What is he supposed to do? He's not old enough to be on his own."

Tony didn't know how to answer her. He knew she was right. He had been about the same age as Darren when he had lost his parents, and look how he had turned out. Most of his early life was one screw up after another, and even now he was still trying to get things straight. Darren was a good kid, and he would probably turn out okay, but with the way things seemed to be going with him now, Tony wasn't so sure anymore.

"I know," he said. He didn't know what else he could say.

"Six months isn't enough time to really figure out some sort of arrangement for him. I have no other family members for him to go to, barely enough money saved up for his college. I just don't know what I can do." She pulled away and looked him in the eye. "If I leave him now with the way he's heading, I know something bad is going to happen. He won't make it out there."

"I know," he admitted. "I'm not gonna give up on finding an answer to this. I will find a way to make it better," he promised, cupping her face with one hand.

"I know," she said with as much of a smile as she could muster.

He wiped away several more tears that fell down her cheek before kissing her forehead.

"You should get some rest. We still have a long flight ahead, and I doubt you actually took a break the past couple days."

She smirked and gave a small chuckle.

"For once, you're right," she said.

"Call up Guinness. We have a new world record. Tony Stark was actually right about something for the first time," he teased as he picked her up and laid her on the bed. "Sleep well, sweetie," he said and kissed her cheek. As he was about to leave, she grabbed his hand.

"Stay, please," she asked, her eyes pleading. "You said we don't have much time left. I want to spend what little of it I can with you."

He smiled softly at her before crawling on the bed and lay behind her, his arm falling across her waist and laced his fingers through hers. They never got much time to themselves to truly cuddle up and enjoy each other, but what time they did get, Tony made sure he made the most of it. He only wished the circumstances were different. There was so much he wanted to do with her, so many things he wanted see with her. She was the only good thing he'd had in his life besides Pepper and Happy, but they were just friends. JC was more. She was a true companion, someone he imagined spending a long life with. She kept him in line in ways that Pepper couldn't, and that was even before they had become a couple. Whether that was because she was willing to shoot him and Pepper would never even dream of it, he wasn't sure. But he was sure that he loved her. She was his life, his angel faced beauty that had saved his life in more ways than one. He knew he could never repay her for what she had done for him. He only hoped he could prove himself in whatever small way he could.

The next few hours passed in silence as she finally fell into a peaceful sleep. Tony stayed awake for awhile longer, but soon sleep claimed him. Before he knew it, the pilot was announcing their arrival and for everyone to take their seats. Gently waking her, Tony helped JC up and both of them took their seats with the others. No one said anything, but Tony saw the look in Darren's eyes and the Cheshire cat smirk on his face. He knew what he had seen.

After landing and getting checked into their hotel, Pepper got back to her work and Tony had given Happy the evening off to recuperate from the jet lag. With the long day planned for tomorrow, he had wanted to let JC relax for the night and spend some time with Darren, but Tony also wanted to be able to spend some private time with her as well. How he was going to do that, he had yet to figure out completely.

With over an hour spent on the phone making arrangements, Tony finally thought up some sort of plan that he thought might just work out. At least, he hoped so. As he entered JC's room, he knew he had to choose his words carefully just in case the paparazzi had already gotten wind of their arrival.

"Hey," he greeted.

"Hey, Stark," Darren said with a wave from the bed closest to the door.

"Where'd your mother run off to?" he asked when he didn't see her on the other bed or anywhere else in the room.

"What do you need, Mr. Stark?" JC called from the direction of the bathroom.

"I uh just wanted to drop off the itinerary for tomorrow," he half stuttered as he realized that she had been in the shower and his thoughts went elsewhere.

"Just leave it with Darren. I'll look over it in a minute and get back to you on it," she said.

"All right then. See ya in the morning then," he said and after setting the paper on the bed, he quickly left the room.

* * *

"Hey, mom, you want me to read you the itinerary?" Darren offered.

"No, just leave it on the bed," she said and walked out of the bathroom with one towel wrapped around her body and another around her head in a turban. "How's the TV?"

"Sucky," he answered. "It's all in French. I have no clue what anyone's saying and there's no subtitles or anything."

"Well what were you expecting?" she asked as she skimmed over the paper and smirked.

"I don't know. But they've gotta have at least one English channel on here. We've got Spanish channels and that kind of stuff back home. Why can't they have something similar here?"

She giggled at him before walking over and ruffling his hair.

"I'm sure you'll find some way to live without TV for a couple days," she said and headed back into the bathroom.

"You still never told me why you wanted me to come along," he said as she started the blowdryer.

"Can't a mother want to spend some time with her son? Besides, I thought you wanted to come."

"Well, yeah, I don't mind coming and all, but you invited me, remember? You never invite me. So what gives?"

"This isn't something life threatening, so I'm actually able to bring you along. That and you have no school. Would you have preferred I left you to sit on a couch?" she asked as she turned off the dryer and set it back on the counter.

"I guess this is better. The sights are definitely an improvement over home. And the girls are pretty cute," he said with a smirk as he gave up on the TV and propped himself up on his pillows.

"I'm so glad you approve," she said sarcastically. "Toss me the hairclip on the table."

Darren did as told and threw the clip to her which she easily caught. Ten minutes later she came out of the bathroom dressed in a knee length red dress and her hair half pulled back.

"Well, don't you look nice. Where are you going?" Darren asked her as he looked her over.

"I'm just going out to see the town. I'll be back later tonight," she said as she picked up her purse and tossed it over her shoulder.

"Can I come with you?" he asked excitedly.

"You are going to stay right where you are. I'm going to go have some adult fun. I'll take you out tomorrow if there's time. Just remember what I told you."

"I know. Don't leave the room, don't order room service, don't do anything stupid. Did I miss anything?"

"No. Just behave yourself, and I'll be back before too long," she said and left the room. Tony's letter had given instructions to some address on the edge of town and that she was to meet him there in half an hour. She wasn't sure what he had planned, but she figured it couldn't be completely terrible. And after the news he had told her earlier, she was hoping for something quiet.

She called for a taxi and went to the address which turned out to be a small restaurant overlooking the sea shore. As she entered she noticed that there was no one else there except for the wait staff which escorted her to an empty table and handed her a menu. She was starting to get skeptical when Tony still didn't show up.

"Bonjour mademoiselle," she heard from behind.

She turned to see Tony dressed up in a nice suit, red rose in hand. She stood and smiled at him but resisted the urge to embrace him. She still wasn't sure if it was safe for that.

"What's the occasion, Mr. Stark?" she asked.

He walked over to her and after laying the rose on the table he wrapped his arms around her.

"Tonight I'm not Mr. Stark. Tonight it's just you and me," he said with a grin before kissing her.

"I take you paid off the entire restaurant then?"

"Pretty much."

She smiled and gave him another peck before sitting back down. He took the seat across from her and took her hand in his.

"You still haven't said what this is all about, Tony," she said as she browsed the menu.

"Can't a man spoil the woman he loves every once in awhile with a nice dinner?" he asked innocently.

"You are still the same Tony Stark, right?"

"Last time I checked."

"Then you are definitely up to something, mister. What's all this about?" she asked again.

"I promise my intentions are purely innocent. Scout's honor," he said, holding up three fingers.

"Why do I find it hard to believe that you were ever a boy scout?" she teased.

After several more minutes of banter they settled down to quiet conversation over good food and fine wine. They talked about how Darren was doing, what was going on in her life, why she had reacted the way she had in the boxing ring. She still didn't want to discuss it all in full detail. She had her reasons for it that went far beyond jealousy. She wanted to explain herself fully to him, but there was no way to without going into details that were really unnecessary. Some things just weren't his concern.

* * *

Tony couldn't have asked for things to go better. Dinner had gone exceptionally well, and Tony knew that it was the perfect time to tell her. He only hoped everything wouldn't backfire. He knew the next part of his plan was the tricky part, but now was as good a time as any.

After they had finished eating, Tony took her hand and led her to the railing that overlooked the Mediterranean. He stood behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist, resting his head against her shoulder as he took in the sight. He had seen Monaco plenty of times at sunset, but with her, it all seemed so much better, so much more beautiful. He almost hated having to ruin it all now.

"JC," he said.

"Yeah?"

"I've been doing some thinking, and it's some pretty serious thinking," he said.

"Oh no. Everyone watch out. Tony's doing serious thinking. His head might explode from the strain," she teased.

He chuckled with her, but quickly got back on track. "Seriously, I've been thinking about Darren and what's going to happen with him."

"And what did you think of?" she asked, her tone becoming more serious.

"I want him to be able to make something of himself without having to worry about how he's going to be able to do it," he explained. "So, I've decided to adopt him."

"What?" she questioned, turning to look at him. "Adopt him? How does that help?"

"That way he will have a legal claim to my money and the company. I'd feel a lot better with my share of the company in hands that I know I can trust."

"Tony, you can't just adopt other people's children. It doesn't work quite like that."

"I know that," he said. "That's not the only thing I've been thinking about," he said, turning away from her for a moment.

"Tony, what are you trying to say? You're not making a while lot of sense."

He took several deep breaths before reaching in his pocket and turned back to her.

"I've been thinking about this for the longest time, JC, and I know that there's no one else I'd rather give this to," he said and knelt down on one knee, removing the ring from his pocket. "JC, will you marry me?"

She gasped as she covered her mouth with one hand. Her breathing became ragged as he saw tears forming in her eyes. When it looked like she was about to collapse he stood and took her hands in his.

"Tony," she breathed. "You know what you're asking me to do? With this?" she said, touching the reactor beneath his shirt.

He knew what she meant, and he knew what he was asking her. This was the reaction he was hoping to avoid, but it was inevitable.

"I know," he said as he lifted her chin to look him in the eye. "I know what I'm asking is hard for you. I wish this were under different circumstances, but no matter what happens from this point on, I want the world to know that I belong to you, that there is no one else on this earth that I would rather be with. And I want to be sure that you and your son are taken care of. I'm trying to protect you and your son in the last way I know how."

"I know," she said as several tears escaped.

He wiped them away and waited for her to continue.

"I need to talk with Darren. I still haven't told him about…this," she said, putting her hand over his reactor. "I'll give you my answer tomorrow after the race."

He kissed her forehead and drew her close. On the positive side, it had gone much better than he had anticipated. He had expected her to say no or be cross with him, but she seemed almost okay with it. Almost. He knew he was asking her to become a widow shortly after getting married, but he wanted it to be her. No matter how much time he had left he wanted it to be with her, and he wanted everyone else to know that she was his and he was hers, and nothing was ever going to change that. He wanted to be able to create a family with her and Darren, wanted to be something more for both of them. Most importantly, he wanted to make sure that they were going to be okay after he was gone, especially Darren. He wanted to give the boy the chance to be able to go to the best school and become whatever it was he chose to do with his life. He only hoped he could be given that chance.

* * *

**AN: Hope ya'll enjoyed it! Don't know when I'll get the next update in since college homework pretty much sucks this semester and eats away every spare moment I've got. I have five about halfway done, but it will still be awhile before I'm happy with it. Anyways, ya'll know what makes me happy :) leave me a review and tell me what you think.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

The next morning Tony was ready to face the crowds. There was nothing that could possibly bring him down. He was hopeful his car would win the race, JC was finally going to give him an answer, and Pepper was going to get her first real taste of the public as the new CEO. What could possibly go wrong? Well, he thought of a few ways it could go wrong, but the odds of any of them happening were low. At least, that was what he hoped. The only thing he was worried about was when everybody finally met his new PA since he had yet to tell anyone.

JC met him outside his room just after noon with Darren in tow. He couldn't tell if either of them were in a good mood or not since JC was already in her mode, and Darren looked like he was bored out of his mind already. Tony only hoped that this wasn't an indication of what he should expect to hear from JC later.

"Good morning, Mr. Stark," she greeted.

He grinned and returned the greeting. "Are you ready for the race today?"

"Sorry, sir, I'm not much of a racing fan," she replied as she escorted him downstairs to the car.

"Too bad. It can be quite thrilling, especially if you're the one racing."

"I'm sure it is, sir. Might I point out the danger of it as well? One wrong move and you're plastered on the ground."

"That's the exciting part. The adrenaline rush, the speed, it's all part of the race," he said excitedly.

"Then it's a good thing you're not going to be part of it," she said with a smug grin.

"I should be able to. It's my car isn't it?" he pouted.

"Yes, it is, but it's too dangerous. Besides, I wouldn't be able to fit in the car with you."

"Yeah, so?"

"I can't protect you in the car or from the car. That makes racing a no."

Tony gave her the puppy dog pout which she easily deflected. She had a knack for being able to do that. Maybe it was a mom thing. He wasn't sure.

"You are such a spoil sport. You know that, right?"

"That's what you tell me every day," she smirked.

When they reached the lobby Pepper was waiting for them, ready to head to the restaurant where they would be watching the race. She looked all primped up, ready to take on the press that they both knew were waiting for them. There was just one thing he was sure she wasn't ready for.

As they pulled up to the restaurant the crowd went into a frenzy and cameras flashed as fast as they could trying to get their money shot of the group. With a final wink and smile JC ushered them inside to what Tony was sure to be even worse.

"Whatever happens in the next two minutes, just go with it," he said under his breath to both Pepper and JC. He knew his only saving grace would be the fact that they were in public.

As they entered cameras flashed as every reporter wanted their shot of the new CEO and company owner. Through the throng of cameras came forward the thing that Tony feared most from the afternoon: his new PA.

"Mr. Stark, how was your flight?" Rushman asked.

Tony saw from the corner of his eye as JC turned a shade of red and her nostrils flared. Her face remained calm, but he knew she was far from it. He looked to Pepper who was flaring her nostrils as well as cameras kept snapping photos.

"Don't flare your nostrils when you're fake smiling," he whispered.

"You're unbelievable," she said through her teeth.

"It was great," Tony said enthusiastically to the waiting Natalie.

"I hope your reservations were satisfactory?"

"Yes, they were. You look great," he said, noticing what she was wearing. It took a second glance to notice just how much she was showing off.

"Why thank you," she said, unabashed.

Realizing he was staring a lot longer than he should, Tony quickly averted his eyes.

"But that's unprofessional," he said quickly and looked towards the tables. Is this us?" he asked.

"It can be," she said without hesitation.

"Make it us," he said. He had to admit, he liked her. She seemed to take his banter quite well and anything else he said. Lost in his thoughts he wandered over to the bar and stared absently at the TV screen, Pepper and JC in tow.

"Why is that slut here?" JC asked quietly.

"Excuse me?"

"That Rushman bitch over there showing half of her bra to God and country. Why the hell is she here?" she clarified.

"If you must know, she's my new PA," he answered.

"Excuse me?" she and Pepper said at the same time.

"Who said you were going to pick your PA? This is exactly why you shouldn't pick your PA," JC sneered as she looked over at Natalie.

"I picked Pepper didn't I? I think I have a pretty good instinct for this sort of thing."

"You didn't pick Pepper solely on her work ethic, and we all know that, Tony. I told you I have a bad feeling about her and you brought her on anyways? What the hell are you thinking, Tony?" she demanded.

"I was thinking that she has good qualifications for the job. She's capable in the office, handles herself well in public, and does quite well under stress, in case you hadn't already noticed," he pointed out.

"She's also hiding something the size of the state of Alaska. Are you really that blind to it?"

"Anthony?" a smarmy voice called from somewhere at the bar, interrupting their argument. Tony recognized the voice and automatically winced.

"My least favorite person on earth! Justin Hammer," he called back cheerfully. Tony wasn't sure what he hated more about Justin Hammer: the fact that he tried and failed to look and act like him or the fact that he was annoying while he did so. Hammer took the insult in stride and acted like it was some sort of compliment.

"Great to see you. You aren't the only rich guy with a car in the race today," Hammer said with the stupidest grin. "Oh, you know…"

The blonde next to him turned, and Tony went a shade paler. "Christine Everheart from Vanity Fair. You guys know each other?"

"Yes, roughly," Tony answered as he stared at her with a knowing glare. This time he recognized her. After her "interview" with him last year and her attacks that later led to him revealing his identity as Iron Man, Tony was sure he wouldn't easily forget her again.

"BTW," he said, "Big story, the new CEO of Stark Industries," Hammer said, jabbing a finger at Pepper.

Christine looked genuinely excited by the change of subject. "I heard," she said, "Congratulations."

"Thank you," Pepper said.

"My editor will kill me if I don't get a comment for our 'Powerful Women' issue."

"Oh, sure of course," Pepper said, false smile in place

"She's actually doing a big spread on me for Vanity Fair," Hammer said smugly.

"Well, she did quite a _spread_ on Tony last year," Pepper said blandly. There was no sarcasm in her tone, but Tony knew it was there, and from the smirk on JC's face, she had heard it, too.

"And she wrote a story, too," Tony added, in case it wasn't clear enough for Hammer. "I was very impressed."

Several looks passed between Tony and pepper and Christine while Hammer was still trying to catch up to what had just happened.

"So, if you'll excuse me," Pepper said and slipped away.

"Don't leave me alone with them," Tony said instinctively. He needed back up, and he doubted it would go over very well if JC pulled out her knives again.

As if on cue, the photographers popped in and Hammer attempted to put an arm around Tony's shoulder. Tony tried in vain to remove Hammer's arm, the tempting thought of ripping it from its socket to choke him with it forced to the back of his mind.

"So, while I've got you here, Tony," Christine said, her recorder in hand and rolling, "This is the first time you two have met since the Senate?"

"Since he got his contract revoked, yes," Tony said as he extricated himself from Hammer, "Yeah, how 'bout that?"

Hammer's smile faded. "It's not revoked. It's on hold."

"Oh, on hold," Tony noted as he made his way towards the exit. "What's the difference between on hold and cancelled?"

Christine turned the recorder on Hammer now. "Yes, what is the difference?" She could smell blood in the water.

"Actually, I'm looking in new directions," Hammer stumbled, trying to steer them towards a table. "I was hoping to present something at your Expo."

Tony nodded and ducked away from the table. "Well, if it works, I will personally make sure you get a slot. There's your story, Christine. Hammer needs a slot."

Hammer chuckled like it was some great joke while Tony was bolting for the door. JC noticed and was quickly at his side. As he made his way, Tony noticed Darren trying to talk to several French women who were obviously way too old for him. JC gave him a quick flick as they walked by. Darren turned and gave her a quick confused glare before giving up on the women and joined Pepper at their table.

When Tony had almost made it to the door JC stopped him. "What's wrong, Stark?"

"It's nothing," he lied. "I just needed some air. Hammer's aftershave was choking me."

"Are you sure?" she pressed.

"I'm positive," he said and walked away again, this time towards the bathroom.

"Then where are you going?" she asked when he didn't tell her.

"None of your business, JC," he said, his chest beginning to become irritating.

"I'm your bodyguard. It is my business."

"I'm pretty sure I don't need a bodyguard here."

"You tend to have a habit for getting into trouble every time you go to another country, Mr. Stark. So, don't mind me if I disagree."

"Just go away, JC," he said tersely.

"I'm coming with you."

"Last time I checked," Tony snapped as he stood at the door to the bathroom, "you aren't a guy. You _can't_ come in." With that he stormed into the bathroom.

Once inside he loosened his tie and undid the top several buttons of his shirt and splashed some cold water on his face. Dark grey lines traced across his chest starting from the reactor and went as high as his collar bone. He could only imagine how far JC's was by now. Last time he had seen hers it had barely even started. He gave the treacherous technology one last glare before pulling out his meter and jabbing his finger with it.

The screen read _Blood Toxicity: 64% _and he glared at it as he put his pricked finger in his mouth to stop the bleeding.

He was at a loss. It was spreading faster, and there was nothing he could do to stop it or even hinder it now. He had hoped that it would go slower, but fate seemed decree that it was finally his time to die. Fate had a funny way of never being on his side. When he wanted to die, it kept him alive to wallow in sorrow, and now that he finally found a reason to live, it was ready to take his life. Could nothing ever go right for him just once?

He stared at his reflection in the mirror thinking of something, anything that could possible help. With the little time that was left, he wanted to do something gutsy, something risky, something he'd never done before that could get his mind off his fate. Then, it struck him.

_JC will be pissed, _his rational half of his mind said.

_But I'll never have this chance again,_ the other half argued.

_JC will be pissed._

_It's just one time._

_JC will be pissed._

_It's once in a lifetime chance._

_JC _and _Pepper will be pissed._

With one last look he asked, "Got any other bad ideas?"

* * *

Over fifteen minutes had passed since Tony had gone in and still he had yet to emerge. JC knew that sometimes a man just needed his private time, but this was ridiculous. She knocked and the door and called in, "Tony, what's taking so long?"

When no answer came, she knocked again and told him to hurry up. When he didn't answer again she looked around to make sure no one was nearby before opening the door and going into the bathroom. It took a split second to realize that he was no longer in the bathroom. She glanced in each empty stall before noticing the open window at the end of the bathroom and cursed.

Rushing from the bathroom she quickly found Pepper to inform her of the situation.

"Pepper," she said, "please tell me you've seen Tony."

"No, he was with you last time I saw him. Why? What's happened?" she asked, concern beginning to rise in her tone.

"I think he may have gone AWOL," JC said quietly.

"Where would he go? And why would he leave like that? How did you lose him?"

"There's no time to explain that. We have to find him before he decides to do something stupid."

"Like that?" Darren asked, pointing at one of the TV screens. JC and Pepper looked up to see Tony Stark in a blue Stark Industries jump suit heading for the pit and replacing a very angry French driver.

"You have got to be kidding me," JC said under her breath as she stared at Tony getting into the car.

"Natalie," Pepper called to the red head who was standing by waiting for instructions. "Did you know anything about this?"

"No, ma'am, I had no idea," Natalie flubbed as she tried to come up with a good answer. JC sneered at her and brushed her aside as she headed for the door, Darren quickly on her heels.

"Mom, what are you planning?" he asked.

"I want you to sit here in the front and wait for me to get back. Understand?" she ordered.

"Sure, but what are you going to do?" he repeated.

"I'm gonna go stop that son of a bitch before he gets himself killed in that damn car."

"And how do you plan to stop a car that's moving at over a hundred miles an hour?"

"Very carefully," she said tersely as she made it to the door. "Now stay here and be ready to get in the car when I come for you, okay?"

He nodded and she left him there, running as fast as she could for the Phantom. There was no time to wait for Happy or Pepper to figure things out. She had to get to the pit and fast before Tony got himself or someone else killed with his inexperience. How she was going to do that, she still wasn't sure. It was times like this she was happy she had a key to the car. She hopped in and sped towards the track. She had considered taking the long, safe route to the pit, but in this kind of traffic, there wasn't time to be safe. She sped for the track boundary and broke through the gate and drove in the opposite direction of the racers to make it to the pit fast enough. When she saw the Stark flag, she sped up, narrowly missing other racers as she came to a screeching stop in front of a disgruntled pit crew. The manager came up to her and started spouting off in French, probably saying something along the lines of "get the hell out of here."

JC wasn't fluent in the language, but she knew a few words and managed to say in a very broken accent for him to give her the headset so she talk to Stark. When the diplomatic approach failed she wrestled the headset away from the manager and half heartedly apologized for tossing him to the ground as she put the headset on.

"Anthony Edward Stark, what the hell do you think you're doing?"

* * *

When Tony heard his full name over the headset in his helmet he could feel his body go rigid. What was worse was that it was JC's voice that had said it. He had expected for her to be angry with him, but he hadn't expected her to catch up to him quite that fast.

"Hey, JC," he said guiltily.

"Pull the car in now before someone gets hurt," she demanded.

"I can't do that, JC," he answered. As much as he hated to do it at this point, he was going to finish this race.

"Yes, you can, and you will, or so help me God, I will force you to."

"And how do you plan on doing that, hm?" he countered. "You going to hop in another car and chase me down? Don't be so dramatic, JC. Just let it go."

"Last chance, Tony. Pull in on your own, or I will make you," she threatened.

Tony saw the pits coming into view and made no effort to slow down. "I'm sorry, JC. I can't do it. I have to do this."

"Then you leave me no choice, Stark."

The next thing he knew he could see someone walk out in to the middle of the track. He recognized the figure immediately as JC, and she had pulled out her pistol. He wasn't sure what her plan was, but it couldn't be good. Several other racers had to pull to the side to avoid hitting her. Tony tried to do the same, but she managed to move with him and aimed her gun at him. An instant later several shots rang out, the pinging of metal against metal on his car causing Tony to flinch.

Was she insane? If she managed to puncture the fuel tanks or the tires, she would probably kill him! Maybe that was what she had in mind. He wasn't sure anymore. He heard the pit manager come back on the headset saying that there was a crazy woman in the street and that he should avoid hitting her or her bullets.

_Great advice, _Tony thought sarcastically.

"Tell her I'm coming in," Tony said urgently as he slowed and another shot hit the car. He watched as JC ran to the pit and he pulled in. The driver he had originally replaced quickly hopped into the car and sped off as Tony walked over to the glaring JC.

"What the hell was that, Alwin?" he demanded.

She continued to stare death at him as he closed the space between them. When he was at arm's length from her she reached out and shoved him away. He stared at her in disbelief, still waiting for a reply.

"My answer is no, you son of a bitch," she growled and got into the Phantom and drove off. Several minutes later, Happy and Pepper showed up, Pepper about to berate him when she noticed the look on his face.

He couldn't believe it. It was all over just like that. He had been summarily rejected and dumped all with one word: no. He knew she would be angry, but psychotic was not what he had expected. He still couldn't understand what had just happened. Why would she do something so radical like that? She could have gotten herself or someone else killed by going out there like that, and she complained that he was reckless? Tony wasn't sure of anything anymore with JC. What the hell was going on with her?

After several more minutes of being berated by Pepper they all piled into a cab and rode back to the hotel where Tony was more than eager to interrogate JC. When he finally made up to her room a maid was already cleaning the room, and JC and Darren's luggage were nowhere in sight. He quickly asked the maid where the guests of that room had gone, which she answered that they had checked out already.

Hoping that he wasn't too far behind her, Tony ran down to the front desk and asked where they had gone. The man behind the desk said that he had overheard plans of a flight home on the next plane out. Losing no time Tony grabbed Happy and told him to step on it to the airport while he got information for the flights departure hoping that he would have time to stop her before she boarded. Her flight was scheduled to leave in forty five minutes and he was still half an hour away from the airport. He wasn't sure now if he would even be able to catch up to her at this rate.

As Happy pulled up to doors Tony bailed out at a dead run hoping that he could still catch her before security. He pushed and dodged and even hopped over suitcases desperately trying to get there, but it was no use. When he couldn't produce a boarding pass or passport the guards stopped him and threatened to detain him if he did not leave immediately. Now he was thoroughly pissed. The day couldn't have gotten any worse even if he had hoped for it. After uttering several expletives and pacing about the security terminal Tony finally gave up and headed back to the car in defeat and went back to the hotel.

His last hours in Monaco were spent sulking and packing and contemplating what he was going to do when he finally got back home. He was sure JC wouldn't be waiting there for him or that she would ever show up at his house again except to maybe clean out her clothes, but he was sure that she would take care of that before he arrived anyways. He wasn't sure whether the worst part of it was that it had been completely his fault that she was angry or that he had no clue why she was so angry. He knew he wasn't helping her stress any, and the marriage proposal had probably only made it worse, but there had to be more to it. Even back in Afghanistan and everything they had gone through with Stane or even back in Tokyo she had never done anything like that. She was better than this, knew what would happen if she did something stupid like that. There had to be something else that was setting her off. There just had to be. Whether it was because that solution made sense to him or that he didn't even want to consider being the cause of her display, Tony wasn't sure. He wasn't sure of anything anymore.

As they flew home Pepper had turned on the news to get stock updates and such when the international news came on. They went through their regular reports of what was going on the Middle East, which was still hell hole since Tony had left. Then they flashed a picture of the French flag and went through the highlights of the Grand Prix accompanied with a very interesting video clip. They showed JC making her way out on to the track and firing at his car and the aftermath of the encounter while the newswoman spouted on.

"Today in Monaco, France the annual Grand Prix was held. With several dozen of the world's leading companies entering their cars in the race, it was no surprise to see Stark Industries enter their own vehicle. What no one expected was that Tony Stark would actually drive his car. Then, the last thing anyone could think of happened." As they played the film, the newscaster continued to narrate. "Here we can see as a member of Stark's personal security, Ms. JC Alwin, makes her way out on to the track and begins to open fire on the Stark Industries car. With a few seconds to spare, Tony managed to pull into the pit and get out of the car to switch with the original driver. Reports indicate that Ms. Alwin had taken the headset from the Pit manager and was ordering Tony Stark to pull over. When he didn't comply with the order, she opened fire."

The screen segued back to a view of the newscaster and a picture of JC in the top right hand corner.

"This leaves viewers to speculate whether this was a last desperate attempt for the bodyguard to get Mr. Stark out or if she has finally cracked from the pressure. With an earlier history of being in institutionalized for psychiatric reasons, one can only guess if this was a onetime incident, or whether this seasoned professional is relapsing into a full mental break down. Perhaps it's time for her retirement."

Not wanting to hear anything else the woman would possibly say on the subject he turned off the TV and tossed the remote away. He couldn't believe any of that, refused to. She wasn't crazy, and they had no idea why she was in psychiatric care. Even if they did, they would tell the truth about it. Instead they made her sound like some psychopath just waiting to come shoot someone in their sleep. Tony only hoped that all this could be cleared up sooner than later.

* * *

**AN: Okay, so I gave you guys a really long one to make up for the lack of updates and the long wait for the next one. For those of you who left me comments, thank you :) You guys absolutely make my day. Hope you guys liked this one and hopefully the next won't be too far away. **


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

After the long flight back Tony wanted to do nothing more than go home and lay down to get some real sleep. By the time he had finally reached home, it was almost 10:00 PM and the jetlag was killer. Tony didn't expect to see or hear from JC ever again, so there was no use in even trying to contact her at that time of night. In the morning he thought of trying to look for someone to replace her, but then it dawned on him that in wasn't really necessary. He had never hired JC because he thought he needed extra security. He had hired her because she needed a job and he was still trying to prove that he was a changed person. He thought he had accomplished that a long time ago and just kept JC on simply because there was no reason not to. But now he was beginning to think that maybe he hadn't changed as much as he would have liked to believe. The old Tony, the one he thought he only pretended to be, was still lurking somewhere inside him. Maybe that side of him was never really gone. Maybe that was just the naïve thinking of a spoiled rich boy. The old Tony would have done what he had, not the supposed new Tony. With that final thought he threw himself on the bed and attempted to get a few hours of sleep before having to get up and do whatever it was that rich men did who no longer had to be in every second of what their company did. Oh yeah, that's nothing.

Morning came too soon, and not even the polarized glass could keep it out forever. Dragging himself from the bed, Tony realized he had forgotten to change his clothes before going to sleep. With his hair sticking out in every odd direction imaginable and his clothes not looking much better, he headed for the bathroom and took a quick shower.

Feeling somewhat refreshed and antsy to go do something Tony got dressed in a t-shirt and jeans and headed downstairs to the garage hoping to finally get some work finished on that old car that had been haunting him for as long as he could remember.

S he came downstairs he noticed someone sitting on the couch. It took another glance to realize that it was JC, a scowl on her face, arms crossed over her chest. He paused not quite sure what to say or do. The thought of immediately getting defensive crossed his mind but quickly retreated when she stayed silent.

"Hey," he greeted with nothing else better to say.

"I didn't come here to apologize, if that's what you were expecting," she said as she stood from the couch.

"I figured as much. You've never been one to do that."

"Listen, I don't want to yell or argue with you, Tony. That's not why I came," she said relaxing a fraction.

"Well, that's a surprise. That's only reason I thought you would come back for. That or to take all of your stuff."

"I never said I quit, Tony. I only said I wouldn't marry you," she scoffed.

"Really? I see. So the part where you jump out on to the track like a crazed person was what? Just you doing your job?" he said sarcastically.

"Yes," she said firmly. "You wouldn't have come in any other way. I did what I thought was right," she defended.

"You realize you could have gotten yourself killed by one of the other racers if they didn't move out of the way? Or me if you had managed to hit the fuel lines or, God forbid, my head? What were you thinking?" he demanded.

"If I'd had time to think, I probably wouldn't have done it. I acted on instinct, Tony. It's what I do. Besides, I have better aim than that. I wouldn't have hit you. And what were you thinking? I even told you not to even think of getting that car, and you went right ahead and did it anyways," she countered, getting in his personal space.

"Well, hell, I figured, 'Gee, I'm about to die. What can I do that would just piss off JC?'"

"Really?" she exclaimed.

"No! Damn it, you always do this. You always make it my fault."

"That's because it usually is your fault," she pointed out.

They both glared at each other, neither one willing to back down from the issue. What had happened to not fighting? Somehow, it didn't matter whether he wanted to or not, Tony always wound up causing a fight, or JC would. It all depended on the time of day it seemed.

"Look, this is in the past now. OK? I came here for something else," JC finally said.

"What?" Tony asked, crossing his arms over his chest.

"I came to tell you I'm going away for the week with Darren."

"What?" he said again, this time surprised. "Why? Where are you going? What about school?"

"I'm taking him camping for the week, mother-son time. I've already signed an extended absence form with the school. We're leaving as soon as I'm finished here," she explained.

"You still haven't said why. Why now? What's going on?"

"It's none of your business why. I just need to be with my son, alone for awhile, away from all of this. We'll be fine, Tony. This isn't something new to me," she said and headed for the door.

"JC, wait," he said, grabbing her hand. She turned and looked at him. "Please, don't go, not like this. If this is because of what happened in Monaco or because of what the news is saying-"

"The news? What about the news?" she interjected.

"You mean, you haven't seen it yet?"

"No, why? What's going on in the news?"

Tony let out a breath before explaining, "They're saying you've lost your mind, that maybe it's time you retired from the job."

She contemplated what she had just heard before looking back at him, defiance in her eyes. "Let them say whatever the hell they want. I haven't lost my mind. I know what I'm doing, Tony."

"I know that, JC. I know you, okay, but please, you have to tell me what's going on."

"What are you talking about, Tony?" she asked.

"They don't call me a genius for nothing. You think I can't tell when something is wrong with you? Something is seriously wrong with you, but I can't help you if you don't tell me what's going on."

"There is nothing wrong with me, Stark," she scoffed, ripping her hand from his. "There is nothing for you to fix. I'm not some piece of armor that you can adjust to work for you the way you want it to. So, back off."

With that she stormed out the door. Tony tried to stop her but it was no use. She refused to hear anything from him. He hadn't meant for it to come out quite like that, but it was too late to take it back now. He knew there was something wrong, but whatever it was, she was not going to let him know. He only hoped that whatever it was wouldn't destroy her the way it seemed to be doing.

* * *

About six hours away just outside of Santa Cruz, California in Big Basin Redwoods State Park, JC and Darren set up their camp site. There weren't many good camp spots near Malibu that JC liked, and it usually wasn't too crowded up at the park this time of year. She hated leaving things the way they were with Tony, but it couldn't be helped. He was so stubborn and pig headed that it was hard not to get into a fight with him, especially after what he had done in Monaco.

She had to admit that she understood now why he did what he had done. He had wanted to feel alive. She knew that. She had been feeling the same way after he had told her the bad news, but she wasn't willing to risk her life to do so. Then again, he didn't have a son that still depended on him. Then again, he had her. She wasn't sure what to make of it anymore. That was part of the reason why she needed to get away from him, away from home. She needed to get her mind straight if she was going to be able to make sense of it all.

The only thing she regretted was that she was going to miss Tony's birthday party tomorrow night. She knew how important it would be for him since it would be his last, but she needed to be with Darren, too. Tony Stark was just going to have to handle himself by himself. She only hoped the Pepper-wannabe bitch kept her hands off him. Otherwise, there would be hell to pay.

The first three days went by just fine. Darren didn't question why he was getting a break from school. He seemed to rather enjoy it compared to Monaco, which she was happy to see. But, by day four he was starting to get curious.

"So, Mom, you never said why you dragged us out here," he said as they sat by the camp fire that night.

"Can't a mom want to spend some quality time with her son?"

"Didn't you say that back in France? Come on, Mom, I'm not top of my class for nothing. What's really going on?"

She poked the fire a few more times before sighing in defeat. "Do you remember that talk we had in Monaco about Tony?"

"Yeah," he answered, "Tony asked you to marry him, and you said no. What about it?"

"There was something else I didn't tell you, something that's pretty important," she said and moved closer to him.

"What is it? What's wrong?"

She stared at the fire and took in a deep breath as she tried to think of the right words to say. How do you gently tell your only son that you're going to die?

"I don't really know how best to tell you this, sweetie, but you have to know. On the flight to Monaco Tony told me about the reactors and how they were causing blood poisoning from the palladium," she explained.

"I remember, Mom. He already told me that you were gonna have to keep drinking chlorophyll to counteract it. What about it?"

"There's more to it. The chlorophyll isn't working like it used to. Tony only has another few weeks to live."

Darren looked from the fire then back at JC. "And you? What's gonna happen to you?"

"Because of his use of the suit, the poisoning has been accelerated for him. If I'm lucky, I have about six months left," she said and looked at him.

The expression on his face wasn't quite what she expected. She thought that he would have been sad or angry or confused or something in between, but he wasn't any of those. He just sat there staring at the fire, a thoughtful look on his face. It was silent for nearly an entire minute before he finally said something.

"If that's the case, then what are we doing out here in the middle of nowhere?"

She was taken aback by his question.

"What do you mean?"

"Come on, Mom," he said with an eye roll. "We both know you're crazy about him. What are you doing up here with me when you should be with him? The guy is about to die, and you just walked away from him. And it was his birthday the other day. Did you even bother to say something to him before we left?"

"I…uh…" she stammered, trying to think of something to say, but nothing came to mind. "Darren, he's…he's not-"

"He's not perfect, Mom. I know. He's only human. But he's trying to do better, and, yeah, he's done some stupid stuff along the way, but if I remember right, you've done some pretty stupid stuff yourself. Am I wrong?"

"I thought you didn't even like him that much," she countered.

"Back when he was a jerk and I thought that he was just trying to suck up to you, yeah, I hated him. I stopped hating him a long time ago, Mom. What makes you think I still don't like him?"

"How about your grades at school," she said. "The past month or so you've been bringing home the worst grades I've ever seen come from you. You want to explain that to me?"

"You think I'm doing that because of Tony?" Darren asked unbelievingly. "That has nothing to do with Tony. I'm happy that you guys are together, because you've been happier. Why would I try to break that?"

"Then what's going on with you? Why are you failing on purpose?" she asked, exasperated.

"How am I supposed to concentrate when you're hiding something?" he exclaimed. "Something is seriously wrong, and you won't say anything. What am I supposed to do? Sit around and pretend everything is ok? I can't do that, Mom, and neither can Tony. We can't help if you don't say something!"

"I don't need any help," she responded, matching his tone. "Why is it the two of you think you need to fix everything? I'm a big girl. I know how to take care of my own problems, and I don't have a problem. I don't see why you two think there's something wrong."

"You can't see it, but you're acting different. You've closed off everything and everyone. Every day I come home and you're locked up in that room of yours doing God only knows what. You're always at Tony's throat for every little thing, like that new assistant of his. He called me and told me what you tried to do to her. What were you thinking? And I don't even have to mention what happened in Monaco. Some people think you've lost your mind. What's really going on, Mom?" he demanded.

Her stare hardened as she stood and headed for her tent with a huff. "There is nothing wrong, Darren, and that is my last word on the subject," she said tersely and zipped up the tent door behind her.

She didn't like being so harsh with him, but what else was she supposed to do? Her problems were none of his concern, and the fact that he had let them interfere with his school work did not make her the least bit happy. The worst part was that he was partially right about it all. She knew what she was doing, and she knew how worried everyone was, but that couldn't be helped. This wasn't something that Darren or Tony could fix no matter how much she wished they could. This was her demon to battle, not theirs. But losing the man she loved and her son in the process were not worth the fight. As she crawled into her sleeping bag she thought about what could be done and what she would do next. The only logical step was to go home, tell Tony the truth, and hope that everything would be okay. But what could a man who was about to die do?

* * *

**AN: Okay, I was able to get this out sooner than I thought, which is a good thing for you guys ^_^ Hope you enjoyed it! And don't forget to leave a review. Ya'll know it makes my world go round :)**


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

The end of the week came sooner than JC had anticipated and a part of her was dreading going back home to face Tony. But a larger part couldn't wait to get back to him to see him again and work things out. She hated to admit it, but Darren had been right. Tony didn't have a lot of time left, and what little was left she wasn't going to squander in the middle of the woods. As early as she could muster, she forced herself up and began breaking down the campsite. After a quick breakfast she and Darren said goodbye to the trees and headed out on the road. She figured that with good traffic they could make it back home by 4:00, still early enough to be able to talk to Tony, not that the time of day had stopped her before.

The ride home was spent in almost total silence. JC had tried to talk to Darren that morning, try smoothing things over, but it hadn't gone as well as she would have hoped for. He seemed happy that they were finally going back, but he was still upset about the argument they'd had several days before. She only hoped that it would blow over when they finally got back home.

When she finally pulled in to Tony's driveway at 4:30 she thought she would feel more relieved, but all she felt was a terrible knot in her stomach that made her want to puke. She wasn't sure why she was this nervous. She had never felt this way before whenever she had to talk to him. Then again she'd never had to face him under the same circumstances. As she stepped out of the car and headed for the door she started getting an uneasy feeling, less queasy more instincts telling her something was off.

"What's up, Mom?" Darren asked, noticing that she was making a face.

"Does anything look different?" she asked knowing something was off, but she couldn't put her finger on it.

"I don't see anything different. Should I?"

"I don't know. I guess I was expecting worse after his birthday. I guess that it all would have been cleaned up by now," she reasoned.

"Mom, I know Tony's known for being a bit of a party animal, but it couldn't have been that bad. I mean, there was nothing about it on the radio on the way home. Usually a Stark party is remembered for like a week afterwards with radio spots and newspaper articles. There was nothing. How bad could it have been?"

"Yeah, you're right. He probably didn't even have much of a party anyways."

With her fears temporarily alleviated she put in her key and walked inside. The sight that greeted her was more than shocking. What used to be the living room was now just concrete flooring and scorched walls. In the middle of the room was a hole drilled through the floor with heavy cords strung through to the basement. JC could hardly breathe at the sight. If it weren't for the rage that was building up she probably would have considered fainting. This beat the time he had crushed the baby grand piano and the Roadster.

"What was that about him not wanting much of a party?" Darren questioned, in awe of the damage.

With a scowl plastered on her face, she walked over to the hole in the floor and looked down to the basement where she caught a glimpse of Tony walking by.

"Anthony Edward Stark!"

* * *

Tony was beginning to think that his name was her favorite phrase when she was angry. Although he was pretty sure the living room was a good reason for her to be mad this time.

He raced upstairs to see JC fuming. Darren just looked speechless.

"Okay, JC, I know this looks really bad, but just give me a few minutes to explain."

"Oh, I hope you have a really good one for this because this is a hundred times worse than the time you decided to put a skylight through to the basement," she fumed.

"Hey, that wasn't even entirely my fault," he defended.

"Oh, right, like the hole in floor wasn't your fault, and the demolished wall wasn't your fault either."

"Okay, the floor I did do. It was the only way to get the cords down there, but the wall was definitely not my fault. Rhodey did that one."

She cocked her brow at him in obvious disbelief.

"Look, the party got a little out of control; suits were involved. Let's not take it much farther than that."

"Are you serious? You've gotta be joking. Am I just supposed to blow this whole thing off? You've practically destroyed the house!"

"Listen, what I'm about to say is gonna make up for everything, I swear," Tony said.

"I highly doubt that," she scoffed and headed for the door.

No. Not this time. He wasn't going to let her walk out. Not again.

"I figured it out," he said.

She stopped and turned, a look of surprise and confusion on her face. "What do you mean?"

"I figured it out. The power source problem is over. I found the solution and already tested it on myself. It works, JC," he clarified.

"I don't understand. You said you tried everything, that nothing worked. How did you…"

"I had a little help from my father, of all people. He left a message on the old 1974 Expo tape. He found it a long time ago but didn't have the capability to create it at the time, so he hid it in the Expo," he explained.

"In the Expo? He hid it on the grounds?" Darren asked.

"No, no, not on the premises. It was in the original model for the Expo. He knew I would figure it out, so he left it behind. I found it, created it, and applied it. It works, JC. It works."

"Tony, I…I don't know what to say," she said hesitantly.

"Listen," he said, taking her hands in his, "I know I've been a real ass lately, and I'm sorry. What happened in Monaco shouldn't have happened. I admit it. It was stupid, and I shouldn't have done it, but I was scared. I was scared of dying, of losing you, of giving up, of everything. I thought I had to do something to feel…I don't even know anymore. I know you already gave me your answer, but I'm hoping that just maybe I can still have a second chance."

"Tony, I know. I overreacted in Monaco. I'm sorry. I haven't been much better the past few weeks," she apologized.

"Then, I guess I'm hoping you'll reconsider. JC," he said, reaching into his pocket and kneeling down, "will you marry me?" He held out the ring to her hoping that this time would go over much better than the last time.

She looked just as speechless as last time, but this time she looked like she was about to cry instead of faint. Tony wasn't sure if this was good or not yet. She stepped away from him and turned to the wall. Tony stood and stared at her expectantly.

"Mom?"

When she still said nothing, Tony spoke up. "JC, you don't have to-"

"Yes," she muttered, cutting him off.

He stood there in shock for a moment as her answer caught up with him. "What?" he said.

She turned and smiled at him as tears began to well up. "Yes," she repeated.

"Yes?" he confirmed, taking several steps toward her.

"Yes, Tony, a thousand times, yes," she said.

A broad smile plastered itself across Tony's face as he ran to her and wrapped his arms around her lifting her up and spinning her around. She pulled him into a kiss as he put her down and smiled up at him.

"This," he said, holding out the ring to her, "is yours."

She held out her hand for him as he put the small diamond ring on her finger.

"Tony," she breathed, "it's beautiful. And I promise that I won't try to beat up Natalie again."

"Actually, Natalie isn't coming back to work anymore," he admitted.

"What? I hope this wasn't because of anything I did."

"No, no," he said. "It turns out you weren't 100% wrong about her. She was kind of a S.H.I.E.L.D. operative in disguise sent to evaluate me."

"Really?" JC said with a cocked brow and a knowing smirk. "And how well did you do?"

"Let's just say they don't want me in their playgroup anymore. They still want Iron Man, just not Tony Stark."

"I take it they've already started looking for a replacement then?" Darren observed.

"Yeah, I think they already found one. Rhodey took the Mark II, and it looks like he already got it fitted with Hammer technology, piece of shit equipment. They'll eventually figure out that they can't do anything useful with the suit without my help."

"Well," JC said, wrapping her arms around his neck, "you won't see me complaining too much about. If this means it will keep you out of the more dangerous situations, then I'm perfectly okay with you not being an Avenger."

"I know, but this doesn't mean I'm gonna stop being Iron Man. You know that, right?"

"Yes, and I wouldn't have it any other way," she said with a smile and kissed him again.

"You know, as happy as I am for you two, could you please save the face sucking for when I'm not in the room," Darren protested.

The two pulled away from each other with a laugh and looked over at Darren.

"Are you okay with this, Darren?" JC asked.

"Are you kidding? I've been waiting for you to say that since he asked you in Monaco. I was just wondering what took you so long," he said with a smirk.

"You know what this means, right? We've got to go out and celebrate tonight," Tony said excitedly.

"Go out? Tony, if we go out, everyone's going to know. We won't be able to keep this a secret anymore," JC pointed out.

"I know. Why should we keep it a secret anymore? I don't want to hide it from the world. I want them to know that you're mine and I'm yours, and there's nothing anyone else can do about it."

She looked at him with that look of seeing him for the first time again. He never knew whether that was a good look or not, but it was one he had become accustomed to. It seemed that every time he thought he was doing the right thing she would look at him like that. It was as if she was always surprised at his actions. By now he thought she would have been used to it. Some things just never changed.

"Tony, that's all well and good, but maybe we should hold off on telling the world for tonight. I want to enjoy tonight without a media fiasco."

He smiled at her and agreed. "All right, JC, but you know we have to do it eventually."

"I know, but there are a few people I'd like to tell before the media does."

"Like who?" he questioned.

"Like Pepper. You remember Pepper, right? Tall red head who used to be your personal assistant. She runs your company now. Any of this ringing a bell?"

"Yes, I remember Pepper. And she doesn't run the company anymore. She's coming back to work tomorrow," he said.

"How come? I thought she was doing a good job and liked running the company. Besides, doesn't she still practically run the company anyways without the title?"

"Yeah, she does. She's terrific at running the company, but the Press is a whole other thing that she just wasn't cut out for, which is okay now that I'm up and running again. She'll continue doing what she does best and I'll be the public face. Everything goes back to the way it's supposed to be. Now," he said taking her hands in his, "go home, get all dressed up, and I will pick you up at eight. I'll do my best to act 'normal,' okay?"

"I can't ask more than that. All right, I'll go. It won't be too hard to convince people that you're there by yourself. I'll see you tonight then," she said and gave him one last peck before heading for the door.

Tony smiled as he watched her walk away. So the proposal hadn't gone quite the way he had planned it, but it turned out better than he could have hoped. She had said yes. That was all he could ask for. She would be his now, and everyone was going to know that he belonged to her. Everything was finally looking up. Nothing could possibly go wrong now.

* * *

**AN: Sorry for the long wait. College sucks up most of my time. Hope you guys liked the update. Leave a review, let me know what you think :)**


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

After leaving the mansion, JC headed for Stark Industries to see Pepper. She had wanted to be the first to tell Pepper the good news, but that was not her only intention. If given the chance, she was going to march up to Rushman and shove her fist down her throat. Of course, that was only if she was provoked, which she doubted would take much. Everything about that woman upset her.

"Hey, Pepper," she greeted after shooing away the secretary for the millionth time. Was Pepper ever that annoying when it came to warding off unwanted guests? JC couldn't remember her being annoying. Direct, maybe, but never annoying.

"I'm sorry, Ms. Potts. She refuses to leave," the secretary announced.

Pepper looked up from the papers on her desk to see what was going on. "JC!" she exclaimed as she bolted up from the chair. "She's fine, Gloria," she said, motioning for the annoying woman to leave. JC gave a smirk before turning back to Pepper and embracing her.

"It's good to see you again, Pepper."

"You're telling me. We all thought you were gone for good. Tony went crazy while you were away. I didn't think the house would survive another day, but now that you're back, maybe you can talk some sense in to him."

"Don't worry. I plan to do just that. That's part of the reason that I came over here. I need to talk to you about something."

"Of course," Pepper said, motioning to one of the chairs across from her desk. "Please, sit."

"No, that's okay. I'd rather stand for this, but you might want to take a seat."

"Please, don't tell me you actually are leaving for good. You just got back. We need you," she pleaded.

"What? No, no, I'm not leaving, but you are going to be a bit surprised when I tell you the news. First, you remember that Rushman bi-"

"Ms. Potts, I brought the paperwork for you to sign," came an all too familiar voice. JC turned to see Natalie handing over a folder to Pepper.

"Oh, thank you, Natalie. What were you saying, JC?"

"Uh…" JC stumbled for words for a moment trying to decide whether or not continue where she was heading with her talk. "Never mind, it really wasn't that important. I can see that you're busy, so I'll get out of your hair. It was good seeing you again, Pep. I'll see you around," she said and walked out. As much as she wanted to tell her about Natalie and the proposal, she didn't feel like starting a fight right there in the office. She stepped outside the office and waited for Natalie to exit.

Checking to make sure the secretary was gone, JC grabbed Natalie as she exited and shoved her against the wall, her forearm pressed against her throat.

"You listen, and you listen real good," JC hissed. "I don't want to see anywhere near Tony, Pepper, or this company ever again after today. If I do, I will not hesitate to break your arms in two. I see you again after that, I'll break your legs. If I keep seeing you after that, I'm gonna break so many bones in your body you won't be able to crawl away. Do I make myself perfectly clear?"

"You wouldn't even stand a chance against me," she gasped. "The only reason you're not on the ground right now is because you've already caused enough embarrassment for yourself. No need to add more to it."

"I've taken on worse than you, bitch. I'm warning you. Stay away from my friends," she growled and let her go.

"You're nothing but a has-been Alwin. You're long past your prime, and you know it," Natalie said as JC began to walk away.

JC tensed up at that remark. She didn't care what the media said about her. They were always wrong half the time anyways, but to come from the duplicitous spy who had been around for less than a week was not something she was willing to stand for. In a swift movement, JC drew her camping knife from its sheath on her belt and hurled it at Natalie hitting centimeters from her face, a lock of her hair falling to the ground. JC smirked.

"I'd say you're wrong about that. And here I thought you S.H.I.E.L.D. agents were supposed to have good Intel."

She turned and began to walk away, a feeling of triumph at scaring the spy. Though she did her best to hide it, JC had seen her eyes dilate, the one sign of fear that was impossible to hide, and hers were the size of saucers.

She heard the distinct sound of the knife flying through the air again as the door to the office opened for Pepper to exit. What took moments to execute felt like minutes in JC's mind as she processed what was happening. She quickly turned knowing that the knife was meant for her, but it would undoubtedly hit the unsuspecting Pepper. With a quick shove she pushed Pepper out of the way and put up her hand to catch the knife between her fingers. In the next instant blood covered her hand while Pepper looked like she was going to scream or faint or both.

They both stared up at Natalie, daggers in their stares. JC removed the knife from between her fingers and wrapped her hand up in a bandanna as Pepper approached Natalie.

"I think it's time you left before I have security escort you out," she said in one of the most menacing tones JC had ever heard from Pepper.

Natalie looked from one to the other in disbelief at what had just happened. JC only hoped that she got in trouble with Fury for blowing her cover. With a humph she stormed off in defeat. JC gave a triumphant smirk as Pepper ushered her into the office.

"What the hell was that? She could have killed you? And you're bleeding all over the place," Pepper said in a flurry.

"I'm fine Pepper," JC said as she started wiping the blood off her hands with the bandanna.

"What do you mean you're fine? You are not fine. Your hands are covered in blood."

JC finished wiping off her hand and held it up to the distraught woman. Pepper stared at it for a moment before realizing there was no cut.

"I don't understand? I saw the knife cut you," she mused.

"What you saw was a Halloween chemistry prank. Darren pretended to cut himself last year. He scared the crap out of me before he started laughing," she explained.

"You mean you planned this?"

"Not exactly like that. I had planned to show you the security tape, but you walking out at that time worked just as well. I wasn't sure she'd throw the knife, but I came prepared just in case. I'm surprised it worked as well as it did."

"And what if it hadn't? What if you had actually gotten hurt?" Pepper huffed.

"Pepper, this is me we're talking about. When have you ever known me to do something wrong with my knives?"

Pepper still didn't look pleased about the whole fiasco, but she let it go.

"Is that what you came to tell me about?" she finally asked.

"Well, that and to tell you the real reason Tony was acting so recklessly. I know he'll never tell you what happened, but you deserve to know. The arc reactors were causing blood poisoning. Tony was about to die, so he acted out," she explained.

"Dying? Oh my gosh, is he okay? What's going to happen to him? What about you? You're not going to die too are you?"

"No, Pepper, calm down. No one is going to die. Tony figured it out just after his birthday party."

"You mean the party from hell?"

"Yes, that party. Don't worry. I saw the damage and gave Tony an earful."

"Good. He needed that. So, are you two okay now? I mean everything. You're not going to step out on to another race track and start shooting at him again are you?"

JC gave a small laugh before saying, "I promise I'm not going to try doing that again. We've settled everything between us. Everything is fine, Pepper."

"Good," she said with a smile. "Tony called a few minutes ago and said he was going out tonight. You're going with him right?"

"Yeah, I will. We-"

"Great, because I have too much to do tonight before going back to work tomorrow, and I don't have time to babysit him," Pepper quickly said.

"Tomorrow? You're coming back that soon? I would have thought you earned to have a day or two off before coming back."

"This is Tony we're talking about. You honestly think he could last one day without someone to remind him to put on his pants?"

JC nodded and had to admit she had a point. All the videos on YouTube were evidence enough of that.

"I guess I'll see you tomorrow then?"

"Bright and early at eight," Pepper said with a smile.

JC smiled back and left the building. When she was back in the car she took the soiled bandanna and tossed it to the back with the rest of the camping gear.

"I take it you saw Natalie then?" Darren asked.

"Oh yeah," JC answered as she buckled up.

"Now aren't you glad I showed you how to use that stuff?"

"Yes, except now my knife and sheath are covered in that stuff. That stuff does wash out right? I was getting kinda fond of that bandanna."

"I'm not exactly sure. I never had to wash out of clothes or anything before."

"Are you serious?" JC asked, giving him and incredulous stare.

"It should," he defended, "I mean, I think it will…This isn't my fault. You're the one who did it."

"I didn't think it was going to get that messy. Whatever was on the knife got on both hands and everything changed color."

"I told you not to cover both hands with the stuff."

"Yeah, well, I didn't know what hand I was going to catch it with."

"Mom, you always throw right and catch left. I don't know why you think you catch with your right hand."

"Well, you never know. One day I'm gonna surprise you and catch one in my right hand, and you are going to eat your words, Mister. Now, let's get you home," she said as she put the car in gear.

"Uh, Mom," Darren said, pointing out her window.

JC looked over to see a fuming Natalie waiting for her.

"'Can I help you?" JC asked as she rolled down her window.

"This isn't over by a long shot," she growled.

"Actually, it is. You're leaving, and I'm going back to work. There isn't much more for us to discuss, so, if you'll excuse me, I have somewhere to be."

As JC was about to pull away, Natalie drew a pistol and aimed it at her chest. JC looked down at it and back to Natalie.

"You won't do it," she taunted.

"Give me one reason not to. You've already blown my cover. You're just a loose end now."

"If you shoot me, you'll have to shoot him too, and I doubt General Fury will look too kindly on the unnecessary killing of a civilian."

Natalie gritted her teeth before lowering the weapon.

"Go back to spy school, Natalie. You still have a lot to learn before you can even think of taking me on," JC said and drove off leaving Natalie to sulk in the parking lot.

* * *

**AN: Okay, so this wasn't the best update in the world. I had wanted to add alot more but knew it would take me longer to write and would be more than twice as long as this one, not that anyone ever minds anyway. Anyways, i promised an update by the end of the month for at least one stoey, so here it is. I hope you guys like it and leave a review. They honestly do make my day :)**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

When Tony finally arrived to pick up JC he knew he couldn't have felt happier. For once in his life after everything that had happened between them everything was finally going right. Nothing could have brought him down now.

"Well, don't we look spiffy," Darren greeted Tony who had pulled out his tux for the special occasion.

"Thanks," Tony said. "Where's your mom? Is she ready yet?"

"See for yourself," Darren said as he pointed to the top of the stairs.

Tony looked up and was speechless. She always knew how to dress for any occasion and look absolutely stunning, but tonight, she pulled out all the stops. Her hair had been curled and pinned up in an ornate arrangement that looked like it must have taken hours. Her red dress looked like a mix between Asian and Spanish design–the top resembled an Asian dress while the bottom flared out.

"You look…" Tony paused trying to think of the right word. Wonderful? Beautiful? None of those words seemed to properly describe her. "Stunning," he finally said, "You took my breath away."

She smiled and blushed as she came down the stairs. "I haven't worn this dress in years. Are you sure it looks all right?"

"Mom, you're hot. Don't be so modest," Darren said.

She raised an eyebrow at him saying, "Don't you have homework to finish, young man?"

"Yes ma'am," he groaned and trudged back to the kitchen.

"Why don't you wear it more often? It really is beautiful," Tony asked.

"I can't fit as many weapons in it. And besides, I can't run very well in it," she explained.

Tony chuckled. Of course that was the reason. Doesn't every woman pick a dress for how many guns she can hide in it? After quickly saying goodbye to Darren they both hopped in the Phantom and drove away.

"So, where are we going tonight?" JC asked.

"Oh, you know, the usual fancy restaurant where all the rich snobs go to get some attention."

"Oh goodie. Nothing like a million cameras to put a person at ease," she teased.

"It'll be fine. There will be plenty of other people for the paparazzi to gawk at. I am hardly front page news anymore."

She looked at him disbelievingly. So he had to admit that last statement wasn't 100% accurate, but ever since his birthday he hadn't done anything that would catch the attention of the media. Though, they never did need much to be on his case.

"Whatever you say, Tony. I guess we'll find out soon enough," she said as they pulled up to the restaurant.

Sure enough the paparazzi was already there snapping as many pictures as possible of the arriving patrons. Happy came to a stop and let them out JC exiting first as per routine. She stepped aside and let Tony out. With a flash of his smile they walked inside, JC keeping a few paces between them. When they were finally seated JC took her usual seat across from him and took on a look that Tony could only describe as mild disinterest.

"I know this isn't exactly like Monaco and we're trying to keep up appearances for tonight, but you could at least not look like you're trying to find the nearest exit."

She let out a sigh and faced him. "I'm sorry. It just feels like if I'm not careful someone is going to take a picture and write some smear article. Besides, I thought this was how I always looked when we went out."

"No, not really. At least, I never noticed before. I guess I just got used to it. It just seems like tonight you're not supposed to look like that."

"Maybe we should have just stayed home instead. It was a nice gesture, but let's face it. This is a bit odd, you know?"

"You're probably right. You think anyone would notice if we snuck out of here right now?"

JC smirked at him. "There's only about a hundred cameras out there. I don't think we've ever been able to escape with that many cameras around."

"I'm willing to make tonight our first success. What do you say?" he said with a smirk.

She looked like she was ready to try it, but her smile quickly turned to displeasure.

"Bitch alert, twelve o' clock," she said looking behind him. Tony turned to see what she was looking at and understood. Christine Everhart was walking in their general direction.

"Oh shit, this is not good," Tony cursed. "She probably saw us walk in. If we leave now, she'll start asking questions."

"She'll come over here as soon as she sees us. I'm sure she'll find something to say about us being together right now. I think she still hates me for what I did at the Fireman's Ball."

"You did try to put a knife through her foot," he pointed out.

"I gave her fair warning before hand," JC defended. "Look, let me try to make it over to the bar. If we're lucky, she won't spot me and just assume everything is normal."

"What if she asks why I'm alone? I never go out alone."

"Make something up. You're good at that," JC hissed as she quickly got up from her seat and found a seat at the bar. A minute later Christine had spotted him and stopped.

"Well, if it isn't Tony Stark," she greeted in that annoying reporter voice. "I'm surprised to see you here without a date."

"Christine, what are you doing here?" he asked trying to be as pleasant as possible.

"My job," she answered. "What about you? No one wanted to join you? I find that hard to believe. Or are you just hunting for your next conquest?"

"Hunting's not really my sport, but you can fish all you want. Shouldn't you be off interviewing someone or something?"

"The word around town is that your deranged security guard is back. Everyone is curious whether or not you're going to keep her as part of your security after the Monaco incident. Would you care to comment on that?"

Of course she wanted to know about that.

"My security is not your problem, Christine. What happened in Monaco was unfortunate, but there's nothing I can do to change what happened. So why don't you run along now and go harass someone else?"

Christine was about to walk away when a commotion started at the bar. Tony looked over to see who had gotten too drunk to stay standing. A crowd was beginning to form while someone asked another to call 911. Now he was curious. A woman stood, supposedly to go call an ambulance, and that was when Tony saw JC on the ground.

He stood and made his way through the crowd to her side. She was panting and a sweat had broken out across her face.

"JC, what happened? What's wrong?" he asked.

"It's…it's hard to…b-breathe," she stammered.

Tony cursed to himself. He hadn't given her the new reactor, and she must have forgotten to change her core again. Tony reached in his pocket and pressed the emergency transmitter for Happy. JC made him carry it around after the he had proclaimed he was Iron Man in case there was an attack and he needed his travel armor or some other emergency. Now he was glad she had made it a requirement.

He took her up in his arms and carried her toward the door, pushing past paparazzi as he went. At that point he wasn't worried about what pictures they did or didn't get. The only thing he was worried about was getting a new core in her and getting her home.

Happy was waiting out front, the Phantom ready to take off as soon as they were inside. Tony quickly got her inside the car and ordered to Happy to drive home.

"JC, look at me," Tony said as he took her face in his hands and forced her to look at him. "Did you change your core recently?"

"Damn it…no…I got..d-distracted this afternoon and…forgot," she gasped.

"Did you bring an extra with you?"

"In the purse," she managed, pointing to her bag that had fallen to the floor.

Tony reached down and picked up the bag. After rifling through it he pulled out the fresh core and helped her get in a sitting position. Tony then unzipped the back of her dress, opening it to reveal the reactor. He carefully pulled it out and removed the burnt core, tossing it in the ice bucket and inserting the new core.

With the reactor safely put back in its place Tony sighed in relief and let JC lay against him as he wrapped an arm around her.

"Please, don't ever do that to me again," he said softly as he kissed her head.

"I promise. I'm sorry I let it get that far."

"Happy, take us back to the mansion. We're going to make sure this never happens again."

It wasn't long before they were both back home. Since the living room area was still a disaster zone, they both stayed down in the basement where JC could sit down on the couch.

"So much for avoiding all the cameras," JC said with a half-hearted smirk.

"It was my fault. I should have given you the new reactor before we left. I should have known better," Tony said caressing the back of her hand with his thumb as he held it.

"No, Tony, I was supposed to keep an eye on it. I got careless. There was no way you could have known. Let's just forget the whole thing, okay?"

"No, we're going to fix this right now," he said, getting up and going over to his work table. He picked up the small reactor and brought it over to her.

"This isn't going to hurt like the last did, will it?" she asked.

"Not really. You might get a bad taste in your mouth though."

"What kind of taste?"

"I thought it was like coconut and metal. It wasn't too bad," he explained.

"Wonderful," she said sarcastically as she turned around and unzipped the back of her dress, "My two least favorite flavors in the world combined into one disgusting mix. Perfect."

Tony rolled his eyes as he got behind her and removed the dying reactor. He gave it one final glare as he set it aside on the table and went to inserting the new reactor. With a twist it was installed, and JC began writhe and make disgusted faces.

"Damn, this is worse than coconut and metal. This is absolutely vile," she said as she beat the couch.

Tony thought he would have found it rather amusing under different circumstances. At the moment he was just relieved he didn't have to worry about her safety anymore.

"Don't worry. It'll go away in a few minutes," he said as he picked up the old reactor and tossed it on the work table to decide what to do with it later. He then rejoined JC on the couch.

"You know, besides the horrid taste, it actually feels…oddly energizing. I wonder why that is."

"It's probably from the fact that you're not being poisoned anymore by the palladium. I felt similar effects."

"You know what it reminds me of?" she asked as she turned and faced him.

"What's that?"

She curled up next to him, her hand sneaking u to play with his hair. "That night in Monaco," she said.

"You mean the night when I proposed, and you couldn't give me an answer?"

"No," she said with a sly grin, "not that part."

"Oh, you must mean the part after that when we stood and watched the sun set over the bay," he guessed again.

"Getting warmer," she said, pulling him in for a warm kiss.

"Oh, you mean that part," he said with a smirk as he kissed her back. "How does all of this bring back memories of that?"

She pulled herself into his lap, straddling him. "I was just thinking we haven't had a chance to enjoy ourselves since then."

"Well, try to remember that it was stress related at the time. We did think we were going to die at the time," he reasoned.

"We're not going to die now. Well, at least not until we are very old and can't even remember our own names," she giggled.

Tony reached up and caressed her face. "I will never forget who you are or what you've done to me. You're my life now, JC. Nothing and no one is ever going to change that," he said and pulled her into his kiss.

Their hands wandered across each other's bodies removing clothes, feeling each other's warmth, the sensations overloading their senses until Tony gentle pushed her over the couch, hovering over her with a gentle smile.

"I love you, Jadvyga."

"I love you, Tony."

* * *

**AN: Sorry for the long time between updates. Between school and the holidays I've had little time to sit down and get some writing done. Hope you like this one, and hopefully I'll get another update done within the next week to make up for it. Hope you guys enjoy. As a;ways let me know what you think ^_^**


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

Morning came all too soon for Tony with a sharp wake-up call from JARVIS. Eight a.m. felt far too early to be up after the previous night's activities. AS those thoughts began to come back to him, Tony pushed back the blanket that was covering him, which he only vaguely remembered grabbing amongst everything else. That was about the time that he realized that there was something critical missing from the picture.

"JC?" he called when he didn't see her anywhere in sight.

"Bathroom," he heard her say seconds before he heard the sound of her puking.

"Are you okay?" he asked, getting ready to go check on her.

"I'm fine. I think I got sick on the camping trip. I wasn't feeling very good yesterday either," she explained.

"Are you sure? Do you need me to-"

"I'm fine, Tony," she interrupted, "I don't need you in here watching me puke. I'll be out in a minute."

Tony accepted her answer and lay back down on the couch to wait for her. Several minutes later he heard a door open and thought it was JC. Much to his surprise, it wasn't the bathroom door that had opened.

"You have got to be kidding me, Tony," an exasperated Pepper said.

"Pepper," Tony said and jerked himself up, "what are you doing here so early?"

"I'm supposed to be here right now, remember? This is my job. And I can't believe you honestly brought someone down here last night," she said, looking over the clothes that were strewn across the floor. "JC just got back and was considering staying, and you're down here screwing some other girl. That's low even for you," she lectured.

"Um, Pepper, this isn't-"

"Isn't what? Don't try to talk your way out of this one. Where is the little trollop so I can show her the door like I always do?"

"She's in the bathroom, but you should know-"

"I don't care what she's doing in there or how naked she is. It's nothing I haven't seen before," Pepper fumed as she headed for the bathroom door.

"Pepper, I really think you should give me a minute to explain something," Tony tried again.

"I don't want to hear it, Tony," she said and reached for the door handle.

As she began to open the door, a surprised JC emerged. In a split second they both saw each other and screamed. Pepper immediately turned around and covered her eyes putting as much distance between her and the door as possible while JC attempted to hide behind it.

"JC, what are you…I mean you're…Oh God I can't believe this just happened," Pepper stuttered. "I'm just going to go upstairs and….yeah, I'm just going upstairs," she managed and rushed back up the stairs.

JC came out a few moments later after Tony assured her that Pepper had made it out of the room.

"I can't believe she caught us like that," she breathed as she came and sat down next to him.

He wrapped an arm around her and drew her close. "Well, it was going to happen eventually. What did you expect?"

"I didn't expect it to happen like that," she said.

"You went to see her yesterday. Did you forget to mention the fact that we were engaged?"

She got very quiet and the look on her face told him everything.

"What _did_ you do yesterday?" he asked.

"Well," she said, "I scared the crap out of Pepper, pissed off Natalie….yeah that's about it."

Tony couldn't help but smile and let a small laugh escape as he kissed her hair. "You are no longer allowed to complain about how I act irresponsible if you are going to keeping doing things like that."

She laughed with him and pulled him in for a kiss. "We should get upstairs soon and explain everything to Pepper. I think she's been traumatized enough for the week."

Tony consented and quickly found his pants and shirt and let JC borrow an extra pair that he had been keeping down there until repairs to the bedroom were finished, and they both headed upstairs to find Pepper trying to distract herself with her laptop.

"Hey, Pepper," JC finally said after a moment of awkward silence.

"I figured you two would have settled everything between yourselves. I just didn't figure you two would do it so…quickly," she said.

"Well, it's kind of mu fault. You see, I meant to tell you yesterday, but I got distracted and you were trying to get back to work, and it just sort of slipped my mind," JC tried to explain.

"Well, it's not really any of my business what you two do with your personal lives. Let's just forget the whole thing happened and move on. I've got plenty of work to do today."

"Well, that's not all, Pepper. There's more than that."

Pepper looked up at her confused. She must have figured that there couldn't be more to explain.

"You see," JC said and lifted her hand to show off the ring, "I'm getting married."

Pepper looked from her to Tony and back, and it was as if a light bulb had just turned on and everything clicked.

"Are you serious?" she asked with an expectant smile.

"Yes," JC said, a grin on her face as well.

Pepper let out a squeal and rushed over to embrace JC. Tony just stood and stared on at the two letting them have their girl moment.

"I can't believe it!" Pepper exclaimed when she finally released her. "It's about damn you asked her. What took you so long?" she demanded.

Tony was caught off guard for a moment and floundered for an answer.

"It's all right, Pepper," JC answered. "He already did awhile back. I just didn't give him an answer until now."

"Okay then, that lets you off the hook this time. What about your son? Does Darren know yet?" she asked.

"Oh crap!" JC exclaimed.

"You haven't told him yet?" Pepper asked, astonished.

"No, not that. He already knows about that. I forgot I told him he could have the car today, and I have the keys in my purse. Damn it, I need to get home," she said quickly and ran back down stairs to gather up her things.

"Why would you take the car keys if you were coming with me?" Tony asked, following close behind her.

"Well, he tried to borrow the car without permission about a month ago, so I keep the keys with me. I hadn't planned on staying the night, so I didn't think anything of it."

"Well, when does he need the car?"

"In about half an hour," she answered. "It'll take at least that long to get across town. Damn this is inconvenient."

"Hang on," Tony said, taking her by the hand. "Take two minutes to go upstairs and put on real clothes, and then I will take you home. Okay?"

"I thought you destroyed upstairs?"

"No, it was just my room that got messed up. The guest room is still intact," he said.

"Then why did we sleep down here if there's a perfectly good bed upstairs?"

"Well, don't forget that Pepper like to use that room on occasion. I figured that was one place we shouldn't do it," he reasoned. "Besides, I didn't hear you complaining last night," he said with a sly smile.

"Yeah, well, that was because I had ample distraction," she said with an equally shy smile.

"Well, the sooner you get back home, the sooner I can distract you some more."

With that reminder, she ran back up the stairs and changed into a spare set of clothes that she had left in case she had to stay the night while Tony did the same. In less than five minutes they were both changed and headed out to JC's home.

"So what sane teenager decides to head out at 8:30 in the morning on a Saturday? I thought it was mandatory for them to sleep until noon," Tony joked.

"He said he was going to get together with some friends and go paintballing and then go see a movie or something. Honestly, I'm happy to see him out being with his friends again."

"Well, I am too. I just wish it didn't have to be today. I was looking forward to spending the morning with just you."

"I think that got ruined by Pepper walking in on us," she teased.

"Maybe," Tony mused. "She's seen worse than that before, so I doubt it made that much of an impact on her."

"Somehow that doesn't surprise me."

They both laughed it off until they finally arrived at JC's home.

"Okay, if he asks, we did not sleep with each other last night," JC said as she rummaged through her purse for the car keys.

"I'm sure he already suspects it, so why not?"

"Because I said…" She trailed off as she looked up at the house. Tony looked up to see what it was that had caught her attention. He didn't see anything obviously out of place.

"What's wrong?"

"Door," she said as she reached down and pulled a pistol from an ankle holster and quickly made her way to the front door.

On a second glance Tony could barely noticed that the door was cracked open. It was so slight that he had barely noticed it the first time, but surely the pistol was a bit overkill. For all either of them knew Darren was outside somewhere and just hadn't shut the door all the way.

"JC, wait," he called after her as he followed.

She obviously wasn't paying any attention to him as she burst through the door and started calling out Darren's name. When Tony finally saw the state of the interior of the house, he understood why JC had pulled out her gun. Furniture had been turned over and anything that had been sitting on a table or countertop was strewn across the floor. However, Tony couldn't tell if it was a robbery attempt gone bad or something worse.

JC finished her sweep of the first floor and made her way upstairs, ordering him to stay put as she did. Tony wasn't sure what was going on or what had happened, but it was apparent from JC's behavior that she knew exactly what had happened, or at least a lot more than he did.

He made a walk through the living room, pieces of glass crunching beneath his shoes as he did. A glass vase that had once contained an arrangement of silk flowers was shattered on the grey carpet. Amongst the wreckage he knelt down and picked up a fallen picture. The frame was broken and the glass had been cracked. It was one of the only pictures that the three of them had taken together after JC's shoulder had finally healed. Tony had managed to sneak them out of the country for a few days to just relax in a small beach bungalow. JC had her arms wrapped around Darren while Tony had one arm around JC, his other hand being gripped by Darren. Tony had been trying to give Darren a pair of rabbit ears, but Darren had made sure that it was impossible. Tony remembered it was the best trip they had ever had. Now all that was left was a broken picture.

Tony was finally brought out of his trance by JC's footsteps treading heavily on the stairs. He looked up to see her grip on the gun slipping, tears welling up in her eyes, her face contorted in anger and agony. When she finally made it down to him it was clear that she had not found Darren.

"They took him," she said raggedly. "Those bastards took my son," she sobbed as she collapsed in his arms. He gently lowered her down to ground as he stroked, doing everything in his power to calm her, but he knew it was no use. Darren was her world, and now he was gone.

"It's okay. We'll find him, JC. We'll find him and bring him home. I promise," he said as he held her closer.

She pulled away to look at him, her eyes searching for some kind of truth to his words. He wasn't sure if it comforted her or not, but her sobbing ceased and she looked beyond him to the door. Tony turned to see what she was staring at to find that there was someone standing in the doorway.

There was a look of shock and horror as the stranger surveyed the house which was understandable. What Tony couldn't figure out was why JC suddenly had that feral look in her eyes. He knew she was upset, but this man didn't look like he knew about what had happened. If anything, he looked just as surprised as they did. Tony had to admit though that the man had a look a familiarity. He wasn't sure what it was, but something in his face looked familiar though Tony was sure he had never seen him before.

"Oh my God," the man finally said with a deep, raspy voice. "Are you…"

Before he got another word out, JC was on her feet and grabbed the stranger by his collar throwing him to the ground. Tony tried to protest, but it was no use. JC didn't want to hear a word. She grabbed the man and began to beat him, demanding what he knew as she did so.

Tony finally got an arm around her waist and grabbed one of her arms and tried to pull her off the man.

"Where is he, you son of a bitch! What did you do with Darren?" She exclaimed as she struggled against Tony.

"JC, he doesn't know anything. If you keep beating him, you're going to kill him," Tony strained as she began to kick out.

"The bastard deserves nothing less. He knew about this. He probably orchestrated the whole thing. He knows where they took Darren!"

Tony finally managed to pull her off the beaten stranger and pinned her against the wall, his grip barely holding against her struggles.

"You can't know that. You don't even know who this man is," he tried to reason with her.

"You think I don't know my own brother when I see him!"

Tony paused for a moment letting what she had just said soak in. She finally stopped struggling as he looked from her to the stranger and back. Her brother? How could it be? And what did he have to do with all this?

"He's…" The words were stuck in Tony's throat. He could hardly even conceive the idea.

"That man is my brother."

* * *

**AN: Well, I managed to get this one out pretty quickly. Not sure when the next one will be since college starts back up in less than a week. Hopefully it won't be too long now that it's finally gotten to the interesting part. Hope you guys like it. Let me know ^_^ **


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

It had taken Tony several minutes to overcome the shock of discovering the identity of JC's brother. She had rarely ever spoken about him in the two years he had known her, and he had never seen a single picture of the man. He remembered JC telling him that the two of them had a falling out when they were children, but that had to have been nearly twenty years ago. Tony would have thought by now they would have resolved whatever differences there were between them, especially with the death of their mother the year before.

With her brother unconscious and safely tied to a chair in the living room, Tony finally confronted JC. If she was determined to kill him, he wanted to know why.

"Okay, now do you want to tell me what all that was about?"

"He took my son. That's all there is to it," she said evasively as she tried to make her way to the kitchen.

"Cut the crap, JC," Tony said as he slammed his palm against the wall making a barricade with his arm. "You are going to be straight with me for once. What the hell is really going on? You know more than you're saying, and it is really starting to piss me off. I'm trying to help you, but I can't until you come clean."

"I didn't ask for your help," she said tersely and ducked under his arm.

On the verge of completely losing his composure, Tony grabbed her by the shoulders and pinned her against the wall ensuring that she would stay put.

"You listen to me. This isn't a matter of whether or not you asked for help. We are friends and, God willing, soon to be spouses. I am giving you my help, and you will take it whether you like it or not, but I can't do anything unless I know exactly what's going on. Now, are you going to tell me, or am I going to have to pry it out of you?"

She let out a sigh and answered, "All right, I'll tell you. Just let me go, will you?"

He did as she asked and released her. She let out another sigh and went to sit on the stairs.

"I haven't spoken to my brother in almost fourteen years and with good reason. Then, about six months ago he sent me a letter. I don't know how he found me, but he did. He said that something was going to happen, but he didn't know when, and he didn't know what. A few weeks later he sent another letter with the same warning. They kept coming every two weeks until two months ago. That's when I started getting one every week, only this time he said that Darren was in danger. I hid the letters from Darren since I didn't know if they were valid or not, but he's smarter than I give him credit for. I'm sure he suspected something from the start, but I had no reason to think that something like this would happen at the time. It was when he tried calling a few weeks ago that I knew something serious was up, that it wasn't just a hoax."

"Is that why you reacted to Natalie the way you did in the ring?" he asked.

"Yes," she answered. "I thought she might be the one that was after Darren. I knew she was hiding something. I just wish I had known she was S.H.E.I.L.D sooner. I was so distracted by it that I didn't see this coming."

"So all this time, Monaco, the camping trip, it was all to protect Darren?"

"I thought that if everyone saw me react the way I did in Monaco that maybe whoever was after him would take advantage of the situation and come for him while we were away from you. I needed them to think I had lost my edge. When nothing happened that week, I came back. I had to. I still thought you were going to die. I guess I really did lose my edge. And now Darren is gone because of it," she growled, balling her hands into fists.

"But how can you be sure that Caleb is behind it? He did try to warn you. Why would he come here if he did it?"

"Because that's how he works," she said, standing up. "He is a master at manipulation. For all I know he sent those letters to get me riled up so he could make his move when he thought I finally cracked. Now he's just visiting the scene trying to act innocent and pretend to help. He's nothing but a lying sack of trash."

"How would you know? You said so yourself that you haven't seen him in fourteen years. Don't you think it's remotely possible that he's changed?"

"I've known him for long enough. People like him don't ever change."

"Look at me. You assumed I couldn't change either, but I have. You don't know that he hasn't changed. What is it that he could have possibly done to earn this much hate and contempt?"

She was about to answer when the both heard moaning coming from the living room. JC moved from her spot on the stairs to living room, a dangerous flicker in her eyes that told Tony this was far from over. Whatever her personal vendetta was against her brother, she was more than willing to see it through possibly before he could tell them any relevant information about Darren. That was what concerned Tony more.

"I see you haven't lost your touch, Sis," Caleb said with a wince. "I was beginning to forget how warm your welcomes always were."

"That's the least of what you deserved. Now," she said, grabbing the arms of his chair and invading his personal space, "where is Darren?"

"I don't know," he answered.

She reached up with one hand and grabbed his windpipe, his breath catching in his throat.

"I'm sorry, but I didn't hear you very well. Where did you say he was?"

"I…told…y-you," he gasped, "I…d-don't…know."

"Killing him now won't bring any answers," Tony said when she didn't release him.

She looked back at him defiantly but hesitantly released Caleb's throat. He gasped for air his body slumping over in the chair.

"I know that you know where he is, Caleb. Why else would you be here right now if you didn't know something?"

"Listen to me. I honestly don't know where he was taken. I didn't even know he was gone until I walked through that door," he said.

"I don't believe you, Caleb. You had to have known. You were the one that kept warning me about it. Stop lying," she growled as she invaded his space making direct eye contact with him.

"I'm not lying," he said, raising his voice.

In an instant JC knocked him over in his chair and pressed her foot on his throat.

"I've known you for a long time, Caleb. I know when you're not telling me the whole truth. You sent those letters, you made the phone calls, and now I'm more than sure that I saw you skulking around here before I took Darren away. Now, I'm going to ask you one last time, and if you don't start giving me some answers I will crush your pathetic little windpipe. Where is Darren?" she asked again.

Tony was already on his feet preparing to step in incase she decided to carry out her threat.

"I…d-don't know…where they took him, but…I k-know…who took him," he gasped.

JC cocked her brow with interest. Now they were starting to get somewhere.

"J-just…let me up."

JC complied and put him right side up allowing him to catch his breath before continuing.

"A.I.M. has him," he finally said.

"Aim? What is Aim?" she asked.

"A.I.M.," Tony said, "is Advanced Idea Mechanics. They're like the Ten Rings except they make the weapons instead of stealing or buying them, and most of their stuff is a hell of a lot worse than some of the stuff that came out of my factories. What does a group of terrorist want with a kid?"

"They don't want the kid. They want leverage," Caleb explained.

"For what?" JC demanded. "What do they think they can get from me by taking my son? I'm not a weapons expert or anything. What do they gain?"

"Listen, I don't know. I wasn't exactly the guy they went to to bounce ideas off of. I just heard rumors, okay?"

"What other rumors did you hear, Caleb?"

"They're building something, something big. There was word going around that they couldn't finish it for some reason. Something about a computer or a processor, I don't know. It was something technical."

"A computer? JC wouldn't have anything like that, not the kind that it sounds like they want," Tony thought aloud.

He looked to JC for a sign of confirmation, but the look on her face was perplexing at best.

"JC?" he asked when she didn't deny it.

She looked away.

"JC, what aren't you telling me?" Tony asked when she refused to look at him.

"Come with me," she said when she finally did look up at him again. She led him away from the living room towards the kitchen and down the hall that led to her art studio.

"Hey, what about me?" Caleb called. "Are you just gonna leave me here?"

"Shut up, Caleb," she called back as she reached for a door in the hallway that Tony assumed was just a small closet or pantry.

She opened the door to reveal a larger metal door with a series of panels that looked like a hand print and a number pad lock. This had to be the secret room that Darren had talked about. JC put her hand on the scanner and entered in the number code. Then a computerized voice asked for a password.

"Darren Caiden Stark," she said to the machine. Several beeps and whirl later the door unlocked and the computer gave its approval along with a welcome.

JC pulled the door open to reveal a flight of stairs that led down in to darkness. She motioned for him to follow and led him down eerie corridor. When they reached the bottom, a row of lights began to turn on and showed the extent of the room. The secret room was more than just a room. It was at least the size of Tony's garage equipped with a shooting range, an arsenal of JC's usual weapons including a few that he had not seen her use, an area that looked like it might have been meant for some sort of training, and taking up most of one wall were multiple screens that Tony could only assume was a computer. This wasn't just some secret room. He felt as if he had just entered JC's version of the Bat Cave.

"What is all of this?" Tony asked as he was still trying to wrap his head around it all.

"You have your base of operations, and I have mine," she offered as an explanation.

"I can see that, but what is it for? I mean, how did it all get down here? No offense, but I doubt work as a security guard for even the richest guys brings in enough money for this kind of stuff."

"It was after one of my first security jobs after I left the military. The Japanese equivalent of you hired me for a job. I impressed him enough to earn a very large favor. He gave me the equipment to keep training in the privacy of my own home as long as I was available for any job that he needed. That's what that is," she said pointing over to the area Tony had assumed was for training.

It was a large square with posts at each corner. Inside the square was a circle that took up most of the area in the square.

"It's a virtual training area, and every year I get an upgrade for it. New simulations of varying difficulty and equipment I'm allowed to have with me. The visors show me the environment and the circle is a moving floor so I can walk, run, do whatever I need without having to worry about running out of room. It's still in the developmental stages, but they're working on barriers similar to force fields in the sci-fi movies so that I can interact more with the environments. I come up to a wall or desk or other object and I can lean against it as if it were there. It's still a few years away, but I get to be their beta for it," she explained.

"It's all impressive, but what about that computer?" Tony asked knowing that they were there for more than a look at her favorite toy.

She took a deep breath and walked over to the computer. It booted up from its sleep and showed off all the things JC had been working on. Some of it Tony recognized as mission information from some of his more recent exploits as Iron Man. Some of it wasn't so familiar.

"This is my JARVIS. It can do everything JARVIS with very few exceptions," she said, sitting down in the computer chair.

"What kind of exceptions are we talking about?"

"It doesn't have the human quality JARVIS has. JARVIS can do everything short of thinking for himself. He has a logic, a type of reasoning, an ability for adapting that can only be described as human. This computer can't do that. Other than that, it could theoretically challenge JARVIS in a way that no other computer could."

"And you think that this is what A.I.M. is after?" Tony reasoned.

"It's the only thing I can think of. But I don't understand why me, why Darren? It makes more sense to just take the tech from the company that gave it to me or just take it out when they tried to take Darren. None of this makes any sense."

"What makes you think they didn't try to take it? Maybe they just ran out of time. Taking something like this out of a room like this wouldn't exactly be a short job," Tony reasoned.

"Maybe we can get a few answers from the kidnapping," she said and started typing commands in the computer.

"What do you mean?"

"There are cameras installed in the house. Maybe we can get a look at the guys who did this, see if they even tried to get in here," she said as videos began to pop up on the screens. From the angles on the cameras, there was one on the door to the room, one that covered the hallway to the bedrooms, the inside of the bedrooms, the kitchen, art studio, two in the living room, the front door, and several more that covered the perimeter of the house.

"Okay, let's start from the time I left at eight and fast forward from there," she said as carried it out. It didn't take long before they found the moment the kidnapping started. "Here at eight thirty this van pulls up to the front door," she said pointing to the courier van. "Two men exit and after what looks like an attempt to get Darren to let them in, they just break through the door."

They continued to watch as Darren ran towards the kitchen looking for an escape only to be cut off by two more men.

"Where did those guys come from?" Tony asked looking to the other cameras.

"Hang on, I'm looking," JC said impatiently as she typed in commands and scanned all the screens. "There, at the studio window. I can't believe I left that unlocked," JC fumed. Tony put a hand on her shoulder trying to keep her calm.

"I'm fine. Let's just get this over with," she said tersely as she continued with the video.

The video continued playing. One of the kidnappers grabbed Darren from behind and failed to restrain him. Darren grabbed the man's arms for support and pulled himself up to kick the other two assailants in the chest before breaking the man's grip and pushing him away. The fourth man attempted to get a hold on him but was stopped by Darren's elbow in his face, and Darren ran from the kitchen to the living room. The other three men got to their feet and gave chase and cut him off. They started to throw punches in another attempt to subdue the boy, but Darren quite skillfully blocked and countered their attacks. With the four men on the ground again Darren ran back towards the kitchen which seemed odd to Tony since the front door was less than ten feet away. Why did he run to the back?

Darren just about made it to the back when one of the men came running in and all but tackled him. Darren shrugged him off and started looking around frantically before grabbing the first weapon he could from the countertop: an ice pick. He jabbed out at the man several times in warning, but the man did not back down. He lunged out at Darren trying to grab the ice pick, they struggled, and the man fell to the ground.

JC gasped and covered her mouth. Tony was just as shocked. The man was on the ground with the ice pick protruding from his chest. The man wasn't dead yet, but he was certainly terrified as he stared in disbelief at the sharp object now lodged in his chest. Darren looked just as terrified and let his guard down long enough for the three other men to get a hold of him and one of them stuck a needle in him. In seconds he stopped struggling and went limp.

"Get the kid in the truck," the leader ordered and one of the men carried Darren away while the other went to check on their fallen comrade.

"Come on, man, you gotta get me to a hospital. I don't wanna die like this," the man on the ground pleaded.

"We don't have time to take you to a hospital. Take him out back, finish the job," the leader ordered. The other man looked at him in defiance for a moment before grabbing the fallen man and dragged him toward the back door.

"Oh no, please, no, no," the man pleaded frantically.

"Gag him before he wakes up the neighbors," the leader snapped and made his way to the front door.

"The boy is in the van. Do you want me to start working on that door?" the other man asked when he had returned from the van.

"You dolt. We're not here for that piece of crap. We need Stark's," the leader said gruffly.

"Why when we have one here for the taking. Why do we even need that kid? He's useless," the other man complained.

"You honestly think we could just break in to Tony Stark's home for his JARVIS when he's got his girlfriend guarding him? No. That kid will be more than enough for Stark to just hand over the JARVIS program. You'll see. In twenty four hours that program is as good as ours."

The third man came in from the back and reported to the leader that the other man had been taken care of. With several final remarks they all walked out the front door and left in the van.

JC stopped the video and just stared at the screen. Tony wasn't sure what to say. He wanted to comfort her, but he was sure that she wouldn't accept it, not now.

"We're going to find him, JC. I promise," he said, gripping her shoulder.

"He…I can't believe he…" she trailed off and covered her face with her hands.

"JC, look at me," Tony said, kneeling down in front of her and took her hands in his. "It wasn't his fault that man died. He defended himself, and that man might have lived. They killed him, not Darren. You taught him to fight and defend himself, not to kill."

"Tony," she said shakily, trying to keep a hold on her emotions, "I didn't teach Darren how to fight. I didn't teach him any of that."

"You didn't? Well, then who did?" he asked.

"I don't know. I'm starting to think I barely know my own son anymore."

"Listen to me," he said. "We're going to find him, and when we do, we're going to find out what's been going on, okay?"

She nodded but didn't look convinced. Tony knew what she was feeling, because in a way he felt the same thing. She thought she had let her son down by not protecting him better. Tony knew he had let Darren down by not being there for his mother, by not being the man he should have been when he needed to be. Well, that was about to change.

"Let's go back up stairs. I'm sure your brother has more answers for us that he's not telling us."

* * *

**AN: I'm SO sorry that I haven't updated sooner. College has been eating away my life right now, so I haven't had a lot of time lately. Hopefully the length of this one will help to make up for the lack of updates, and I will try to get another update done soon. To those of you who have not given up and have been waiting very patiently, thank you very much. You guys are awesome! And to those of you who leave me those wonderful reviews, you are double awesome! **


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

After some more "persuasion" on JC's part Caleb was much more forth coming on how to find Darren and the reason behind his knowledge of A.I.M. Apparently he had worked for A.I.M. transporting weapons, supplies and anything else that the organization needed moving. During one of his trips he had heard rumors of a big project that was supposed to put A.I.M. at the forefront of all weapons technology. The rumors had started over a year ago, but it wasn't until now that whatever they were working on was finally making exponential progress and now they were in a rush to get it finished before the superiors decided to give up the whole project. Caleb said that he left the organization one month ago to try to help protect Darren. JC wasn't convinced and Tony wasn't completely convinced either, but for the moment Caleb was being helpful and that was all Tony could ask for at the moment. If what the kidnappers had said was remotely true, they had less than ten hours to try to find where Darren was being kept before they made demands for JARVIS.

JC had taken Caleb down to the Bat Cave trying to narrow down possible locations where Darren might be kept. Apparently A.I.M had more than a few locations within a 100 mile radius of Malibu where they had operations going on. JC wasn't sure that they were so nearby given how much time had already passed, but if they wanted to exchange Darren for JARVIS, they would have to be somewhere relatively close by. So far, they hadn't gotten anywhere.

After a few hours had passed everyone was starting to get tired and hungry. Since rest was out of the question, Tony went upstairs to make sandwiches for everyone. It wasn't very filling, but it solved one of their problems for the moment. Tony brought the sandwiches to the basement and handed them out.

"Caleb, take a break. I don't want you eating at the computer," JC said, pushing him aside.

"I'm not that much of a slob," he complained as he stood aside.

"Caleb, we grew up together. I know how much of a slob you are and I don't need crumbs in my keyboard. Go sit over there with Tony, then you can come back," she said and started to eat her food.

"So what's the status?" Tony asked, leaning against the computer desk.

"So far we have it narrowed down to about fifteen possible sights. I sent out a message to S.H.I.E.L.D. about the situation and have asked for any information on the sites that they may have. So far I haven't heard back from them," she reported.

"So what are you doing now?"

"I'm trying to hack in to one of the satellites owned by the company that gave me this computer, see if I can get any images of the locations. It could help narrow down where they're keeping Darren, maybe give us a clue about what they're building," she said, her face contorting in disgust.

"You all right?" Tony asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine. It's just this damn food poisoning I got from camping," she said as she put one hand over her mouth.

"If you don't feel well then maybe you shouldn't be eating that," Tony suggested.

"It's a little late for that. Move," she said quickly as she shoved him away and ran up the stairs.

"Is she all right?" Caleb asked.

"She'll be fine. She got food poisoning while she was on the camping trip," Tony explained, resisting the urge to glare at the man. If it weren't for him, JC wouldn't have had to go in the first place and probably would be just fine.

"Oh, I see," Caleb said, a guilty look on his face.

They stood there in silence for a few minutes not quite knowing what to say to each other. Tony still hadn't quite made up his mind about the man. JC hated him for unknown reasons, and his presence was a little too convenient for Tony's liking. However, he had so far proven to be quite useful in trying to find Darren, which made it more difficult for Tony to make up his mind.

It wasn't long before Caleb had finished his sandwich and went back to the computer probably trying to finish what JC had started. Tony looked to the stairs and listened for any sign that JC was returning. He wanted to talk with Caleb alone, but if JC was going to simply walk in on them, he didn't want to risk it. When he heard no sign of her he turned to Caleb, eager for answers.

"So, Caleb, when was the last time you spoke to sister? I mean actually spoke to her in person," he asked.

"Oh, wow, I have to think about that for a minute," he answered, pausing for a moment. "It must be nearly fifteen years or so. I can't exactly remember. Why do you ask?"

"No big reason. I'm just curious why immediate family members would simply severe all communication for no reason. It seems rather odd, don't you think?"

"Yeah, I suppose it would be. Why are you asking all of this?" Caleb asked turning to him.

"When you first walked through the door, JC was willing to take your life without a single hesitation. I have to wonder to myself why a woman who is normally so cool and collected would be set off by a man she hasn't seen or heard from in years," he pondered.

"In case you forgot, her son was just taken, and she thought I was behind it. Did you ever think that maybe that was the reason behind her actions?" Caleb countered.

"Maybe, but I know there's something more to it. She's been hinting at it for years now, but she will never tell me what's really going on. So, I'm hoping you'll give me a few answers that she won't."

"What are you talking about? What is it exactly that you're after, Stark?"

Tony moved closer and leaned against the computer desk. "Something happened between you two when you were kids, and she still has strong feelings about whatever it was. You must know what it is. I need you to tell me what it is."

Caleb leaned back in his chair and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Listen, Stark, what you are asking of me is not easy to answer, and quite frankly would be rather suicidal for both of us, especially if my sister finds out."

"That's why she's not going to find out. Caleb, whatever it is, you need to tell me."

Caleb gave a heavy sigh before conceding. He leaned forward in his chair, his features hardening, becoming more serious.

"You want the candid truth?" he asked.

Tony nodded wishing that he would come out and say it already. He'd had to wait over a year before he could even get a hint about what had happened, and he didn't want wait another second. He had to know the truth that JC seemed so hesitant to keep from him.

Caleb stood and leaned in close to Tony, putting his lips to his ears and whispered.

* * *

After concluding her business with the toilet once again, JC wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and went to sink to wash her face. She hated being sick since it almost always involved this, but this felt a lot worse that having a cold or the usual stomach bug. At least when it was one of those she could hold down some sort of food, but as of right then, she couldn't seem to hold anything down.

She splashed herself several times with cold water and wiped her face before staring at herself in the mirror.

"Next time check all the food before going camping, you nitwit," she said to her reflection.

She stepped out of the bathroom ready to go back downstairs when she caught a glimpse of something on the kitchen floor. She stooped down to get a closer look at it and noticed that it was blood, more than likely from the man that had died. Forcing back the memory of him being dragged off, JC reached into the cabinet below the sink and pulled out a kitchen cleaner and some bleach and scrubbed at the spot. After a few minutes of cleaning, the spot finally came off leaving no visible trace that it had ever been there. JC threw away the paper towels she had used and surveyed the rest of the damage to the house.

Even though she had watched the video and knew exactly what had happened and explained all the damage, there was still something that the video couldn't explain. Darren had the perfect chance to escape out the front door. If he could have gotten away so easily, why wouldn't he? It didn't make any sense to her. A lot of things didn't make sense. Why would A.I.M. take her son first before demanding JARVIS? Everyone knew that she was Stark's bodyguard, but no one knew that they were lovers. So what made them think that threatening her would produce results from Tony?

Maybe they thought she would demand that Tony comply with their requests. Tony was Iron Man and typically threats from terrorists didn't faze him the way they would a normal person. Maybe they thought that a request from a friend would sway his decision. She wasn't completely sure yet, but she was determined to find out one way or another. But first, she wanted to know why Darren hadn't taken the opportunity to get away. Since there was nothing more she could learn from watching the video, she thought that if she ran through the events herself would provide a few answers.

She put herself in Darren's position, remembering what exactly had happened that night. She stood in the front entry hall and stared at the door. He heard the door bell ring and went to answer it. Before he would be able to open the door he would have had to disable the security system since JC had armed it after she left. She placed her hand of the keypad and put one hand on the door knob.

He opened the door and started talking with the strangers at the door. The strangers tried to persuade their way in, but something didn't seem right. They were too persistent in wanting to get inside the house. Darren said no and told the men they needed to leave. When all else failed the men started to force their way inside. Darren tried to get the door shut even for just a few seconds to lock it or reset the alarm. That would have at least set off the alarm if the door was reopened and not shut before it finished arming. But Darren had failed both options since the men had gotten in and the alarm still hadn't been set off.

She stepped away from the door and walked back down the hall toward the kitchen imaging Darren trying to run. He was stopped by two more assailants. He was flustered for a moment and got caught by one of the first men. There was no escape so he fought. He managed to get out of their grip and took the first available exit through the dining room to the living room. She imagined him seeing the front door, the perfect exit, but he had been cut off again. He tried to double back, but the other two men were ready for him. With no other options left, he fought them again using anything in the room as means of subduing them.

He had them on the ground again, and no one stood between him and the front door. This is where she got lost. Instead of running to door, he turned and ran back down the front entry hall to the kitchen probably to head for the back door. She stood there for a moment trying to figure out his actions.

"You had the perfect escape, Darren. So why wouldn't you take it?" she mused to herself. She thought back to the video and tried to remember any minute detail that could explain it. He would have had an adrenaline rush, thinking three steps forward to get away from them. It had all happened in an instant, but for the briefest moment, Darren had looked to the front door and out the front window before heading to the back. She too looked to the window from where he had been standing trying to get an idea of what he might have seen. There hadn't been any more men, the outside cameras had proven that much. The men who had come in through the back must have gotten in to position before she left the house. They would have had to since the cameras didn't spot them until they entered through the window. So what was it that had stopped the boy?

She kept staring, trying to remember anything from the videos when it struck her. He would have been able to see the courier van from the window. "You saw the van and thought there could be more waiting for you out there. That's where they tried to take you when they first got a hold of you, and you didn't want to be captured. So you ran the only other way you could think of," she said.

She continued with her simulation and headed back to the kitchen trying to head for the back door, but one of the men got up and took him down. Darren, in his desperation to get away grabs a weapon. He didn't want to kill the man, but at least immobilize him enough that maybe the others would be distracted by their comrade and give him a few extra seconds to get away. He wouldn't have been able to make it to the car, or even use it if he could, but it might have been enough time to get to a neighbor or somewhere that he could get help. But all of that backfired when the man had tripped and the ice pick had gone through his chest. The boy hadn't been ready for that and was stunned long enough for the others to get to him.

"You were almost out Darren, but you weren't ready to take a life to save your own," she said, kneeling by the spot where the man had fallen. "I'm sorry, Darren. I should have been here to protect you. I should have taught you how to protect yourself better, but it looks like you saw to that yourself. Why, Darren? Why would you hide this from me? Why couldn't you have just come to me?" She waited for an answer that she knew wouldn't come and sighed. "I wouldn't have listened, would I? I didn't want you to even consider becoming like me, and I wouldn't have listened if you had asked. That didn't really stop you from trying anyways did it?" she mused.

All of a sudden JC was torn from her thoughts when she heard yelling coming from downstairs. She couldn't imagine what could have caused a fight in the few minutes she was gone. Tony didn't seem like he held any bad feelings about Caleb, but then again, maybe he had found something out about Darren that Caleb had decided to keep a secret.

JC rushed down the stairs to break up the fight when she found Tony on top of Caleb looking like he was about kill the man with his bare hands.

"You son of a bitch," Tony snarled. "You don't deserve to live."

"What the hell is going on down here?" JC demanded as she grabbed Tony by the shoulder and pulled him off Caleb.

"I warned you, Stark," Caleb gasped. "Don't say I didn't warn you."

"No, Caleb, you won't have to worry about her killing you, 'cause I'm gonna do it myself," Tony growled.

"That's enough from both of you," JC snapped, pulling Caleb up off the ground. "Now, one of you is going to answer me whether you like it or not. What happened?"

"You refused to tell him the truth is what happened," Caleb answered. "I told you what would happen, Stark. I warned you."

"Yeah? You forgot to mention the part where I rip your pathetic heart out," Tony threatened as he tried to push back JC. She still wasn't one hundred percent sure about what was going on, but she wasn't about to let the two of them go at each other again. She held her ground against Tony and forced him back.

"I said enough, Tony. Caleb, you sit back down and get back to work," she ordered, pointing to the chair. "And you," she said, jabbing a finger at Tony, "get upstairs right now."

Tony glared at her then Caleb then back at her before conceding with a huff. Whatever happened between the two had to have been serious since Tony never made death threats lightly. The only other time she had seen him that angry was after Stane had tried to kill them. Even when he had gone to Gulmira to take care of the Ten Rings he had been calmer, not by much, but enough to make a difference in his actions.

After she had him upstairs in the kitchen she shut the outer door to the basement so that they could at least have some privacy. Tony stood in the kitchen fuming, his hands balled into fists so tight that his knuckles had turned white.

"Would you care to explain what I just saw down there?" JC finally asked.

"You want me to explain what I did? Why don't you go first, hm? Let's start with the fact that you've been keeping what your brother did a secret for twenty years," Tony demanded.

JC was taken aback by his statement. Now it had made sense, but why would Caleb tell him? He would have to have known what Tony would do to him. She didn't need this right now, didn't want to deal with it.

"Tony, it's not a big deal right now. We need t-"

"Not a big deal? Jesus Christ, JC, the man raped you in your sleep as a child, and all you can say is that it's no big deal?" Tony exclaimed, slamming his palms against the counter top. "Why in God's name would you not say something to someone? You had to know that there was something wrong about it. Why, JC?"

JC fought hard to keep her emotions in check at that moment. Most days it was easy to push that memory to the back of her mind, keep it locked away just to avoid the pain that came with it. But now it was right there in the open, staring her in the face like the horrible monster that it was. She hated the feelings it brought with it. That moment of weakness, of helplessness that she had felt that night. Even now as an adult those feelings were still very real just as when they had first happened.

"You have no idea how hard this has been for me. You don't know what it's like to wake up in the middle of the night to find the one person you thought you could trust your life to betray you. I was scared, Tony. I was so terrified; I didn't know what else to do. My life was very different then. My brother was willing to hurt and even kill me if I fought him for any reason, so I didn't push him. That's why I never told anyone, but he knew, Caleb knew that he was dead to me from that day on," she explained trying to control the quiver in her voice.

"But why did you think you had to keep it a secret from me? I don't understand, JC," Tony said, softening his tone.

"I guess it didn't seem like it would matter. It was twenty years ago, and I thought I would never see him again. It's not like I broadcast my life story to everyone, Tony. I've moved on with my life, or at least I've tried to. I didn't want it to be something that controlled my life."

"I understand that, but you still wanted to kill him when he came through the door. You still carry that anger for him, and rightly so, but if you're not careful, those emotions will have more control over you than you'll admit. I already know that much," he said, obviously referring to his previous actions.

"That's why I didn't tell you," she admitted. "With everything that's going on, it's hard enough for me to keep a clear head. I needed you to be my rock, the one thing to keep me going straight. I still need you, Tony."

"I know," he said moving closer to her and taking her hands in his. "But you need to trust me, too. You don't have to carry everything alone."

"We all have secrets, demons that burden us. I know you have your own, Tony. I watch you deal with them every day. Caleb is my demon to bear."

"I understand, but try to remember you're not alone. I'm always here for you."

"I know, Tony. I know," she said and wrapped her arms around him and just held him there. This is what she needed, what she wanted more than anything. She wished that just one time the universe would finally let her have happiness without any strings attached but that was probably asking too much. Just as she was beginning to enjoy the moment Caleb came through the door.

"Guys, I hate break up the moment, but I really need you two downstairs," Caleb said.

JC broke away from Tony and glared at Caleb. "What is it, Caleb?"

"Look, I know this is everybody-kill-Caleb-time, but there's some scary black guy on the screen that say he wants you two. He says he's from S.H.E.I.L.D. or something," he said.

Without another moment's hesitation, JC hurried down the stairs hoping that Fury had some good news. Anything was better than nothing at this point.

"What do you have, Colonel Fury," JC said as she took her seat at the computer.

"I'm afraid we don't have much yet," Fury reported. "So far all our agents have reported no signs of your son or any related activity, but we are still waiting for several to report in and several more have been sent to the other possible locations that you sent to us. If he's there, we'll find him and get him out."

"No, Fury. If you find him, you let me know, and I will go get him. Your Agent Rushman already proved how badly they work under pressure. I would prefer my son walked out of wherever he's being held alive and uninjured thank you very much."

"My agents are more than capable of performing a snatch and grab mission if and when your son is located," Fury defended.

"Don't mind my skepticism, Colonel, but I'm more qualified than most of your agents," she shot back. "If my son is found, you'll let me know."

Fury scowled at her before saying, "I'll make sure you're informed of any changes," and cut the transmission.

"Was that strictly necessary to call his agents incompetent?" Tony asked from behind her.

"I did not call them incompetent. I'm sure they're very capable at attaining information and working recon, but I'm not about to take any chances with Darren's safety. It's already been almost seventeen hours since his abduction, and the kidnappers seemed confident that you would hand over JARVIS in after twenty four hours. So far, no demands have been made. We have seven hours to find Darren and stop whatever it is that they're planning, or we'll have no choice but to negotiate with a group of terrorists. I don't know about you, but I refuse to give in to these arrogant bastards without a fight."

* * *

**AN: Hey everyone. Sorry for the long awaited update. School is almost over for the semester, and I can finally get back to work on this story. There probably won't be very many more chapters left, maybe four more at most. I'm not entirely sure yet, but that's just the approximation for right now. Hopefully I'll have the next chapter ready, but I won't ppost it until I come back from my summer trip unless I'm able to get an internet connection while I'm gone. Anyways, thanks again for sticking with me this long, and I hope you all enjoy the update! You guys are awesome!**


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

Another five hours passed by, and still there had been little progress. Several locations had been crossed off their list of possibilities thanks to the efforts of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents and some help from the Japanese satellite JC had managed to hack in to. However, there were still too many possibilities left for them to make even an accurate guess. One wrong move at this point would either force A.I.M. to hide Darren somewhere even farther away or even kill the boy, and JC was not about to let either one happen. At 6:30 all three of them were tired, and Tony knew that they weren't going to get anything done while they were dead on their feet. JC seemed very well aware of that fact as well.

"Caleb, you should get some rest. You've been at this all day," she said, touching his shoulder.

"I'm not tired," he answered, trying to rub away any signs of tiredness from his eyes. "I can keep going for awhile longer."

"We can't afford to lose any time on this. Go get some sleep, and I'll keep working. That's only way we're going to be able to get through tonight," JC reasoned.

"No, I'm fine. I can do this," Caleb tried again.

"Jerkus, get upstairs to the couch before I kick you up there," JC said and pushed him out of the chair. Caleb gave her a defeated glare before trudging upstairs.

JC took his spot in the chair and continued to type commands in to the computer to redirect the satellite to another location. Tony pulled up another chair next to her and sat beside her.

"So, Jerkus, is that another Lithuanian name?" Tony asked half joking.

JC gave a small laugh before answering, "No, it isn't. When we were very young, maybe eight or nine years old, we had nicknames for each other. I hated my first name and Caleb knew it, so he would call me Jaja. His middle name was Lithuanian, Herkus. So, I called him Jerkus all the time. I don't think it's ever bothered him like it mine did."

Tony laughed along with her, enjoying seeing her softer side. It was understandable why she was so tense at the moment, but it was still good to see that she was able to lighten up even if it was only for a moment.

"It sounds like you two had some good times together," he said.

"Yeah, yeah we did," JC mused. "Even after…what happened between us, there were still a few times where it would be like it never happened. For a few minutes I would be able to forget what he did, and we would have this moment, one of those rare sibling moments where we get along like best friends. But it only ever lasted for a minute or two. Our little moment would be gone, and everything went back to what was normal for us."

"Do you think you ever could have forgiven him? Not now, I mean, but maybe at another time, another place, do you think you could have ever forgiven him?"

She leaned back in her chair in contemplation. Tony was sure he already knew what the answer was, but he still wanted to hear from her.

"I don't know," she finally answered. "He never seemed apologetic about. Over time he started being nice to me, nicer than usual. I always thought that he was trying to make me look like the bad guy since I never treated him the same. Now I look at it like it was his way at trying to atone. I don't know, Tony. Maybe in another life, maybe there would have been a chance. I've spent most of my life hating him. I don't know if I can."

Tony had to admit he was surprised by her answer. He had expected her to say never, but it was still good to hear her say it. At least it meant that maybe she hadn't given up all hope on her brother. He stood and moved behind her placing his hands on her shoulders and massaging them. She leaned her head back and groaned.

"Oh, that feels good," she moaned.

"You know, as much as I hate to say this, you might just change your mind. You thought you could never forgive me, that I would never change, and look where we are now. I'm not saying it'll happen any time soon, but there's always a chance."

"Maybe," she conceded, "doubtful, but maybe. Oh, God, that feels wonderful."

Tony smirked. He still had that special touch. He leaned over and gave her a peck on the cheek.

"You need sleep too, you know," he murmured in her ear.

She groaned and pulled away from him.

"No, I don't. Somebody has to keep an eye on this. The satellite isn't going to direct itself," she huffed.

"I will take care of this. You have been sick all day and working for half of it. You need rest, and if you don't get upstairs to bed, I will drag you up there myself."

"What I need is food that won't make my stomach flip again," she groaned.

"Well, come upstairs, and we'll find something for you," he said and pulled her chair towards the stairs.

"No, Tony," she whined. "It's not finished yet. I still have to-"

"No arguing. The satellite will take another ten minutes before it's in position again. That's more than enough time for me to get you upstairs, find food, put you in bed and get back down here to watch the computer. Let's go," he said and took her by the hand.

She gave him a glare before letting him take her upstairs to the kitchen. Once there, Tony opened the refrigerator and rummaged through it.

"Okay, let's see what we have here," he said as he pushed aside several cartons of Chinese takeout, leftover pizza, and a casserole dish of something that looked past its prime. So far, none of the choices sounded like something she would keep down.

"Is there any bread in there?" she asked.

"Yeah, there should be," he replied as he continued his search and found the remains of the loaf in the back of the refrigerator.

"Just make me a piece of toast. Maybe my stomach will like that instead," she said as she lifted herself up to sit on the countertop.

After quickly tossing two pieces of toast into the toaster he made his way over to JC and took her hands in his.

"So," he said, "have you thought about what you want for your wedding?"

She groaned and said, "This is hardly the best time to be talking about this."

"Knowing us, we will never have a good time to be talking about this. It might as well be now since we have about two minutes. So, come on, tell me what your thoughts are. Big, small, indoor, outdoor, theme, something, anything."

"Well," she said after a moment of thought, "I've already done the big white wedding, and it's not all it's cracked up to be, and besides that, I don't exactly have a lot of friends or family."

"Okay, I'm thinking small wedding out on the beach in two weeks," Tony blurted out. For him it seemed logical. It would be different for her, and it was what he had wanted when he had first thought of a wedding. He didn't have many friends either, just Rhodey, Happy and Pepper. There was JARVIS too, but he was pretty sure that computers hardly counted. With no family left either, he didn't see much point in having a large wedding with people he barely knew or never met.

"So soon? That's hardly enough time for me to even find a dress, and for all you know it'll rain and then what do we do?" she said as if she was trying to find any excuse to put it off.

"I don't want to wait any longer than we have to. I've already put off asking you for so long and after this whole thing is over, I don't want to wait any longer. Please, say yes. And don't worry about finding a dress. I know plenty of designers who would be more than happy to have one ready in that amount of time," he said with a smile.

The toaster made a 'ding' and the two pieces of toast popped up signaling they were finished. Tony stepped over and grabbed both pieces and handed one to JC.

"What do you say?" he asked.

She heaved a sigh and took a bite of her toast before hopping off the counter and heading for the stairs.

"I'll think about it, Tony. I don't want to think about it right now, okay? Let me go sleep on it or something," she said and began to go upstairs.

Tony nodded and let her go before heading back to the basement to check on the computer. He checked on the progress and saw that there was still another couple minutes before the satellite would be ready, so he sat back in his chair and nibbled on his toast. He was already half way through eating when he realized he should have added jelly or something else to it. Dry toast might be good for a sick stomach, but in general it really wasn't that good. As he finished it off and wiped the crumbs from his face the computer began to beep, signaling that it was finished.

"Okay, show me what pretty little pictures you've been taking," he mused as he typed in several commands to bring up the images. The majority of them looked like the other images from the other bases: perimeter security guards, a few delivery trucks, several other vehicles, and a helipad. Tony took one of the pictures of the supply trucks and enlarged the image to get a better look at the cargo that had been unloaded. Most of the equipment he recognized as spare computer parts. He continued scrolling through the pictures until he came across one that showed several vehicles including one white courier van.

As an idea began forming in his head he rummaged through several images from other sites and looked at any vehicles that weren't a semi truck. None of the other sites had courier vans. He then pulled up the video surveillance of the van that had taken Darren. There wasn't a great shot of the license plate as it drove away, but there was just enough for the computer to pick up several of the numbers. He then looked back at the courier van in the photo and typed in commands for the computer to try matching any numbers it could find in the image. While the computer did its work, Tony looked again at the photo of the parts. As he stared more intently at the parts something seemed amiss. There were too many parts for the average CPU and too few for some of the larger systems that Tony had seen.

The computer started beeping again. Tony looked to the screen with the license plate comparison. The computer read it as only a 62% positive match, but Tony was more than sure that it was the same vehicle. With his thoughts racing a mile a minute he printed out the image of the supply truck and ran upstairs to the living room where Caleb was sound asleep.

"Caleb, wake up," he said shaking the man.

He muttered a few incoherent words before rolling over. Tony shook him again and repeated for him to wake up. This time he propped himself up on one arm and looked at him groggily.

"What now? I was just getting to a good part," he mumbled.

"I need you to look at this. Do you remember any other shipments with these kinds of parts?" Tony asked as he shoved the picture in his face.

Caleb took the picture and examined it for a minute. "I don't know. I think maybe I did. I can't remember exactly. I took a lot of shipments to that place. I can't keep them all straight," he said.

"Are you sure it was this exact place?" Tony pressed.

"Yeah, I'm positive. I recognize that big scorch mark on the concrete beneath that truck. Why? What's this all about?"

"Because I think I know what these are," Tony said as he made his way to the stairs.

"Wait a sec. What are they?" Caleb called after him.

"I'll tell you later," Tony threw over his shoulder and went to JC's room. She was on the bed when he entered and sat up.

"Tony what is it?" she asked.

"Come on get up. We have to go right now," he said and grabbed her hand.

"Why? What's going on? Did you find something?" she asked as he pulled her down the stairs.

"I'll tell you both on the way there. Caleb, get in the car now," he ordered.

As soon as everyone was in the car Tony sped off down the road. Time was of the essence now, and he wasn't about to waste a minute.

"Tony, where are we going?" JC finally asked.

"My house. I can't go storming an A.I.M. facility without my suit, can I?" he answered.

"That's assuming we know where to go. What did you find?" she said.

"Look at this," he said handing her the photograph. "Those aren't normal computer parts. They're building a computer big enough to hold JARVIS. If that's the final shipment of parts and assuming we only have two hours before they make their demands, they're only two hours away from completing it," he explained.

"How big of a computer are we talking about? The one at your house isn't that big and JARVIS fits in there," JC said.

"JARVIS isn't stored at home. That's just one point of access for him. JARVIS isn't just a little program you can fit on a disc or a USB drive. His program, his memory, everything that makes him a good program is in a massive storage facility. It takes a minimum of 3,000 square feet of memory storage, computer servers, all of it to hold JARVIS. To build something like that takes time. That's why A.I.M. waited so long to do anything about it. I don't think they counted on us figuring it out this soon."

"Yeah, but if this is where they plan to store JARVIS, how do we know that Darren is there?" Caleb asked.

"Darren was taken in a courier van. This is the only site that has had any courier vans that we know of in the last twenty four hours, and computer confirms that the license plates match for both vehicles. He's there. He has to be," Tony explained.

"Assuming all of this is correct, we're going to need more than the two of us to get in there and get out," JC said.

"What am I? Chopped liver? I'm coming with you guys," Caleb interjected.

"And what good do you think you'll do? You don't have combat training or a suit of armor to protect you. You'll be nothing but a sitting target in there. You're staying behind," JC said.

"You guys don't know your way around the facility. I do. I'm going with you."

"Can you at least use a gun" she asked.

"Of course I can. That was the first thing we got taught before we were allowed to take any shipments," he said grimly.

JC looked at him disapprovingly but conceded. Tony knew they were going to need more help than just them, but he had an idea for that.

"It's still going to take more than just the three of us. Got any bright ideas, Tony?" JC asked.

"Rhodey still has the Mark II. He'll be able to help us. You know we have to let S.H.E.I.L.D. know too. They might be able to help," Tony suggested.

"I don't want their involvement if it can be avoided. So far they've proved to be sloppy and ineffective. Don't call them," JC said.

"JC, we—"

"We don't need their help," she said cutting him off. "I'm not planning an all out assault on the facility. We need to get in quietly, and hopefully get out quietly."

"I'm not leaving that facility without destroying the tech they're using for JARVIS. I don't need them getting any other ideas about trying to take him again. We are going to need S.H.I.E.L.D.'s help if we're going to pull this off."

"Fine," she conceded. "But I don't want them in there until after I have Darren. I don't need one of their agents setting off security and getting him killed."

"Agreed," Tony said. "But you're going to need more than whatever arsenal I know you have hidden back there."

"I didn't exactly have time to grab anything. You ran us out the door. I suppose that means you have a plan?"

"Still making it up as I go along, but I've got a surprise for you that I think you're gonna like," he said with a smirk.

* * *

**AN: I am so sorry I haven't updated sooner. I've been gone for the past month and haven't had alot of time to get this finished since I got back. Hope you enjoy this one. There's only about two chapters left, maybe three depending on how long the they get, but it's almost over! :) As always, your reviews are most welcome and appreciated.**


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

JC stood staring at Tony's special project with a less than enthusiastic look on her face.

"Ready to try it on?" Tony asked when she didn't leap at the chance.

"If that thing is what I think it is, I am not wearing it," she said pointing to the blue, rectangular shaped case on the floor.

"What do you think it is?" he asked confused.

"It looks like the football case, and you know I can't handle a full suit of armor. That thing is just going to slow me down," she said, arms crossed over her chest.

"Okay, I'm confused. What's the football?" Caleb asked.

"The President keeps a case known as the football that carries nuclear codes. Tony keeps one with a set of armor in it," JC explained.

"It is not another football. Would you just try it?" Tony pressed as he picked up the case and held it out to her.

"Fine," she huffed. "How does it work?"

"Take off your jacket," he said. She did as told and tossed her jacket at Tony's desk. He motioned for her to turn around which she did. "How found are you of this shirt?" he asked when he saw that there was no hole in the back for her reactor.

"At this point, not very," she answered gruffly.

"Good," Tony said, and with a quick snip from a pair scissors he found amongst the mess on his desk he cut a hole in the shirt big enough for the reactor.

Tony then picked up the case and turned it around to show off a pair of backpack straps attached to the case. After getting her arms through each strap Tony pressed the pack in place until he heard the click of the pack connecting with the reactor. JC then buckled the straps at her chest and waist and pulled the straps tight.

"What now?" she asked.

"Put your hands through the loops up here and push up and out," Tony explained, pointing to two metal loops on either side of the top of the pack. She looked at him skeptically but did as he had instructed. She put her hands through the loops and pushed up. The loops extended up and metal began to wrap around her arms until both were completely encased. She brought her arms down to look at the tech.

"What is this?" she asked as she continued to examine it.

"I know you hate the whole armor, so I thought this was a better idea. You can still handle your guns, and now you've got two repulsors. You might need the extra fire power in there," he explained.

"Very nice," she said with a smirk.

"Hey, do I get one of those?" Caleb asked. They both turned to him with a glare. "Just thought I'd ask," he said putting his hands up in surrender.

"All kidding aside, we're going to need one hell of a plan to get in and get out relatively unscathed. Any ideas?" Tony said.

"Can you pull up any schematics of the building? If there's some way to get in easily, I could sneak in and secure Darren before you storm in and destroy whatever it is they were building for JARVIS," JC suggested.

"Okay, JARVIS, you heard the lady," Tony said as he took a seat at his desk. "See what you can find about this A.I.M. facility," he said as he typed in the specifics for JARVIS.

"Of course, sir. It will take me a moment to locate the schematics for the facility," JARVIS reported.

"Make it fast, honey."

"Caleb, what can you tell about the security in the facility? Any possible loop holes, weak areas, anything," JC asked, the gears in her head probably going about a mile a minute. If there was anything Tony could say for her it was that she was a master of thinking on her feet. He had to admit he couldn't even compare with her on one of her bad days, and right now she was almost at the top of her game, ready to pounce at a moment's notice.

"As far as I know, security is pretty air tight. No one gets in or out without a security card, and there are check points all over the facility from what I remember. And that's just the small section that I was in. I can only imagine it gets worse the further in you get," Caleb answered.

"Every system has a weakness somewhere that can be exploited. Do you know where they might hold Darren?" she continued.

"I didn't get that far into the facility, but I did get some info from some drunk guards. There's an area towards the back of the facility where prisoners are supposed to be kept. The only way I know to get there is to go through the thickest part of security. That involves cameras, some lasers, and an army of guards and commandos. We're gonna need one hell of a distraction to get through there."

"We need to try to avoid that until after we know where Darren is and can secure him. If they catch any sniff of an escape plan, they're likely to cut their losses and kill him. JARVIS, what do you have?" she asked the computer.

"I have found a set of blue prints for the facility in question," the computer reported.

"Pull it up, Tony," she ordered. He did as told and pull the schematics from the screen and out on to the floor through the holographic projectors. "Okay, Caleb, show me all the security checkpoints you know of and the area they might keep Darren."

Caleb began marking most of the doorways as security points and a small area where he thought the prison would be.

"What about the main frame for JARVIS? You said you had delivered parts before. Where were they taken?" Tony asked.

"All the parts were taken here," Caleb said as he pointed out a large open area near the middle of the facility. "The last shipment of those parts I took were several months ago and nothing had been built yet that I could see. If they were going to build something the size that you're talking about it would be in this area." He pointed to a much smaller area still in the middle of the facility.

"That's not nearly big enough. There has to be another area," Tony said.

"No, it's plenty big enough. You see all these walls? All them have been knocked down. It's the only other large open area in the building that wasn't already in use for other projects," Caleb said.

"What do you think, JC? Caleb's probably right about security. It doesn't look like there's an easy way in," Tony said as he examined the schematics. He had to admit he was pretty impressed. He had expected it to be a secure facility, but from the looks of the security that Caleb had pointed out it was even more secure than most of Tony's facilities. The fact that most of their operations were illegal might have had something to do with it.

"What's this right here?" she asked, pointing to what looked like a ventilation shaft.

"It looks like the air conditioning. Most of those vents aren't big enough for a person to fit through though. The only larger vents are the ones that run to these computer rooms, but there's no way of telling which shafts are larger than the others. I wouldn't suggest that as an entrance. Besides, I've heard there's a bunch of laser motion detectors in there. I doubt you could pull it off," Caleb said.

"JARVIS, what can show me for sewage or waterways? They can't have much security for those areas," JC mused.

"One moment," the computer said before pulling up another schematic showing the pipelines.

"Can you show me how they both overlap?" she asked.

With the main schematic in one color and the sewage in another, JARVIS overlapped the two outlines. JC stared at the layout for several minutes deep in thought.

"JARVIS, show me the ventilation system," she finally ordered.

"Were you not listening to what I said? Any vents that lead to Darren will be too small, and the larger ones lead straight to an army of guards. The vents aren't an option," Caleb insisted.

"I'm not trying to get directly to him through the vents. Just shut up so I can think," JC snapped.

JARVIS did as instructed and pulled up another diagram layering it on top of the other two. JC continued to stare at the plans.

"Caleb, you have a security card that still works, right?" she asked.

"Yeah, but it won't do us much good. Unless you plan on going through the front door," he added sarcastically.

"That's exactly what you're going to do," she said firmly.

"Excuse me?" Caleb exclaimed. "Have you lost your mind? I can't just take you two through the front door. You're both kind of recognizable."

"You're the only one going through the door, Caleb. I need someone on the inside with a key to get me through the checkpoints," she explained.

"What about me? How am I getting in?" Tony asked.

"You'll be blasting your way in. It'll be nearly impossible to get you in with any amount of stealth while you're in your suit. I'm sending you in through the sewer system here," she said pointing to the pipeline. "Follow the pipe until you get to the boiler room here. There shouldn't be too much security in that area. Wait for my signal before you enter the building. I'll need Darren secure before all the alarms are set off."

"What about you? How are you getting in? And after that, how do we all get out without getting killed?" Caleb asked.

"I'll be going through the vents to where the computer parts are being stored. I'll need you with your security card to get me out of the room and through the next checkpoint," she said.

"And what about the security? There's supposed to be motion detectors in the vents. And besides that, you might not even fit. What's your plan for that?" Caleb questioned.

"You can't put motion detectors in ventilation. Dust sometimes builds up and when they turn on the system it sets off the alarms and makes them useless. If there is a security device on the vents, it'll be on the vent covers. It'll set off the alarms as soon as the cover is removed. It's a fairly easy bypass. One of the first tricks I learned early in the business," she said with a smirk.

"What's next?" Tony asked.

"From the storage room it's not too far to the prison. There's maybe two more security checkpoints. I doubt your card will get us all the way back there, but we'll use it until it no longer works. After that we'll probably have to fight our way back. Once we have Darren I'll give you the signal to make your move. By then Rhodey will be in position and ready to move. Between you and him there should be ample distraction for the guards. We'll make a run for the door and get as far away from there as possible. With any luck we won't take too much fire."

"This is all assuming that his information is reliable," Tony pointed out. "For all we know security has changed or he's wrong about the prison. What then?"

"We'll adapt on the go if we have to. For now, this is all we've got, and we'll have to make it work. There's no time left to come up with something else. Gear up," she ordered and left the room.

* * *

An hour later JC was making her way through the ventilation system of the A.I.M. facility. The only part she absolutely hated was getting from the ground up in to the ceiling vents; it was always the most difficult and most dangerous. Thankfully Tony had a few toys that would prove to be very useful. A small grappling hook took her up and, what was essentially a glorified skateboard, rolled her swiftly and quietly through the vents. She had to admit one thing: Caleb wasn't kidding about the vents. It was tight quarters giving her the feeling of being a sardine in a can. Along with her vest of knives and two shoulder holsters, the pack that Tony had made for wasn't helping matters much. While it was relatively small in comparison to his suitcase armor it was still bulky and cumbersome in the vents. Even so, she was sure it would probably come in handy when she was no longer in the vent.

Her thoughts were running over a mile a minute. She couldn't help but worry about whether or not Darren was okay or if he was even in this facility. If they were wrong, it could spell total disaster. She only hoped that Caleb and Tony would pull off their parts without a hitch. She was confident that Tony wouldn't blow it, but she still had plenty of concerns about Caleb. She had no idea how well he would perform under pressure. She only hoped he didn't screw it all up.

Before long she was hovering over one of the vent covers that led down into what was supposed to be the storage area for the computer parts. When she looked down to get some kind of view of the room she noticed that the parts were not simply being stored there. From the looks of it, they had all been assembled, each server evenly spaced like a grid. This was not a good sign.

After a quick examination of the cover she found no signs of any kind of sensors. Had Caleb been wrong? Or was it all just some rumor passed along to discourage someone who might think of using the vents? And if Caleb was wrong about the security for the vents, could there be more that he had been wrong about? JC hoped not, or everything was going to go to hell real fast real soon.

Grabbing the cover with both hands she gently pried it loose and pulled it up into the shaft. When no alarms sounded and no guards came rushing in she carefully lowered herself down and gently landed on top of one of the servers. She then quickly hopped down and hid behind one of the servers and waited for Caleb.

After several minutes of waiting Caleb still hadn't showed up. Now she was beginning to worry. He should have been there long ago. Had he been caught? Did his card not work? As these thoughts and several others began running through her mind her earpiece started beeping signaling that someone was calling her. She looked to her wrist where the reciver was and saw Caleb's name on the ID.

"What's going on?" she demanded.

"We have a problem. They've changed the storage area," he reported.

"I can tell. All the parts in here have been assembled. Where are you now?"

"They made me take an elevator down to some basement area. I've never seen this area before, and from the sound of it, Darren is down here somewhere. I heard some guards saying something about having trouble with a kid. It's gotta be him."

JC felt her heart stop for a moment. How was she supposed to get down there? That hadn't been on any of the schematics, and she had no idea how to get through the security to that area.

"What do you suggest we do?" he asked.

"I don't know. See what you can do about finding Darren. I'll try to find some way down there," she said and pulled herself back up in to the vent. "Tony," she said into the earpiece after hanging up on Caleb.

"What is it?" he replied.

"We've hit a snag. It looks like Darren is being kept in some basement area. It looks like all the computer stuff is still on the first floor, but we still need a way down there. Can JARVIS show you any routes on your HUD?"

"Gimme a sec," he said and began talking to JARVIS. After another minute he finally said, "JARVIS thinks the most possible route is twenty feet in front of you. Take a right, go another ten feet and to the left there might be a vent leading downward. Just watch yourself. No telling what security there might be."

"Understood. Are you in position?"

"Ready and waiting," he reported.

"Good," she said and started down the shaft again. "I'll be another few minutes. Let's just hope nothing else goes wrong."

JC continued down the shaft in the direction Tony had suggested. She prayed that JARVIS was right. Otherwise they were going to need a new plan which would probably involve more brute force than they could afford. Luckily JARVIS was spot on in his calculations. She found a shaft that led downward and she assumed that it had to lead down to a basement; it went too far down for anything else. She attached the end of the grappler to the top of the vent and slowly lowered herself down until she reached another vent cover.

Peering down she could see a catwalk hanging over a large open area. She couldn't make out any other details of the room from her angle. After quickly checking the vent for any sensors she popped it off and dropped down to the walkway. She checked both ways to make sure no guards were in the area and continued. With a better view of the room she could see that it was mostly empty space with what looked like large doors on the floor. She could only assume that it led down to another level of the facility and moved on.

"Caleb," she said in to the earpiece, "I'm in. Any idea where the prison is?"

"Where are you?" he asked.

"There's some large open area. Looks like a garage or something," she said.

"I haven't seen that part yet. I don't have a clue. It could be anywhere down here. You're on your own," he said.

She rolled her eyes and continued until she saw a doorway. She went through and checked the halls. When she saw it was clear she continued down looking for any kind of markers on the walls or a guard station, something that could tell her where to go or at least give her a vague idea. She didn't get much farther before sirens started blaring and red lights began flashing in the halls.

JC cussed under her breath. "Caleb, please tell me that wasn't you," she demanded.

"It wasn't me," he exclaimed.

"Tony, was it you?"

"No, it wasn't," he replied.

"You might want to get in here. Sounds like everything is going to hell," she said and hurried down the hall trying to find the source of the alarm. Several guards went running by her down the hall. She hoped that they might be able to lead her to the source of the alarm, so she kept her distance and followed them. They turned down several halls before she could hear the sounds of men grunting. After turning another corner she could see several guards trying in vain to restrain someone; it was Darren! And he wasn't alone. Natalie Rushman had managed to find her own way into the base and was fighting off the guards with Darren's help.

Not wasting another moment, JC put her hands through both loops on the pack and pulled up, ready to fight. She pulled back the first guard she could get her hands on and punched him square in the jaw. Another turned and attempted to subdue her. He met a similar fate as the other one. She continued to fight them off, making her way slowly but surely to her son. It came down to the finally four, Natalie taking care of two leaving one for both her and Darren. It only took a sharp hit to the man's nose for JC to subdue him, and she grabbed the man who had his arms around Darren's neck giving him a swift kick to the abdomen and punch him in the face. Darren, still thinking he needed to fight, swung at JC. She deflected his hit and grabbed him by the shoulders.

"Darren, it's me!"

He stared at her for a moment as the words seems to register in his mind. In an instant his arms were wrapped around and she hugged him tightly.

"I knew you'd come," he said into her shoulder.

"Damn right, I came," she said as she pulled away to look at him. "But you and I are going to have a serious talk when we get home about where you learned to fight."

"Does it really matter that much?" he asked with a cringe.

"Oh yes, it does, mister," she said in her I'm-still-your-mother tone.

"No, thanks, I didn't need any help back there," Natalie said sarcastically as she finished off the last guard.

"I noticed you had everything under control. What the hell are you doing here anyway?" JC demanded. "I never told S.H.I.E.L.D. we were coming here."

"You didn't have to. This facility was next on our list. I was sent to check things out. I would think you'd be a little more grateful since I just saved his life," Natalie snapped.

"You didn't _save _anyone. You managed to set off every fricking alarm in the building," JC fumed, pushing Darren aside.

"I didn't do anything. He's the one who set off the alarms," Natalie said pointing at Darren. "He broke out of his cell, tried to escape on his own."

JC turned back to Darren who had a sheepish look on his face. She wasn't sure whether to be proud that he had managed to escape or mad that he had nearly gotten himself killed trying to play hero. She settled for a glare.

"We'll discuss this when we get home. Right now we need to get out of here. I'm assuming you have a way to get out?" JC looked to Natalie.

"Of course I have a way out," Natalie sneered. "Come on."

She started to lead them back the way JC had originally come. They turned another hallway and were greeted by five more guards. They all skidded to a stop, and without thinking, she held up her hands and shot at the guards with her repulsors. All five were thrown back and knocked against each other; JC, unprepared for the force of the repulsors, was pushed back nearly falling over herself.

"Holy crap, Mom!" Darren exclaimed. "When did you get those?"

"Call it an early wedding present. Just don't let me do that again," she said grimacing. Pain was shooting through her injured shoulder from the recoil.

"Are you all right?" Natalie asked.

"I'll be fine," she grunted. "Come on."

"JC, you there?" she heard Tony ask over her comm piece.

"What is it, Tony?"

"We've got a big problem. Where are you?" he said before an explosion went off on his end.

"We're on our way out. What was that?"

"Don't worry about me. Do you have Darren?"

"Yeah, but—"

"Then get out of here," he cut her off. "I'll meet you outside if I can."

"Tony—"

"Just go, damn it! Don't argue!"

"What's going on?" Natalie asked.

Before she could answer the building began to shake. They all looked to each other for some sort of answer.

"We need to get out of here. Sounds like Tony and Rhodey are going to blow this place to kingdom come," JC said and grabbed Darren by the arm dragging him down the halls.

They continued down the hallways until they were almost to the catwalk. As they got closer gunfire and explosions could be heard. As they made their way out on to the catwalk JC looked out on what had been the garage looking area. It was hardly recognizable. Scorch marks adorned the floor and walls and there was a large hole in the ceiling more than likely from Tony blasting his way through. She looked down to see Tony and Rhodey in a fighting stance staring down their opponent. JC couldn't believe what she was seeing; it was another Iron Monger looking suit of armor.

* * *

**AN: Yay for a faster update! Only two more chapters to go and then this story will finally be over, which I'm sure many of you will be happy for. Let me know what you think ^_^**


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15 **

Tony stared up at the red, iron giant trying to form some sort of plan. JC should have been well on her way out with Darren giving him one less thing to worry about for the moment. The armor was thicker than his own, probably heavier as well. That would give him some advantage in speed, but with the firepower that he could see, he was outmatched slightly. With any luck between him and Rhodey they might have a shot at beating him.

Tony knew the only chance they were going to have at beating the man in the armor was to get him to open up his armor the same way he had done with Stane. The only problem was he knew nothing about this armor. Stane had used his designs, so Tony had a good idea on how to render him blind. But this armor was foreign to him. He needed time, a chance for JARVIS to scan the armor for possible weak points. So far the only possible point he saw was the glowing star on the giant's chest where a possible power source might be. The only other possibility was his neck. That was where Stane's weak point had been. There was a small chance the same could be true for this giant.

"Rhodey, I need a little distraction here. Think you can give me a hand?" Tony said over his comm.

"I'm on it," he replied and began flying around and shooting at the iron giant.

The giant put up his arms in defense before trying to swat him away like a pesky fly. Tony maneuvered his way around to his back to see if he could get a view of any wiring. He thought he could see something in his neck and attempted to get closer. As he did, the giant grabbed him in one hand and pinned him to the wall, the force of it crushing his armor. He winced, grabbing the arm that had him trapped and tried to force it off. It was no use.

"You fool," the giant said, his voice distorted and metallic sounding. "You should have just handed over the JARVIS program. It would have been so much less painful."

"Tony!" a voice cried out from above. Tony thought for a moment that it had sounded like JC, but it couldn't have been. She was supposed to have gotten out already. He looked up to see that it was indeed JC up on a catwalk with Darren beside her and…Natasha? What was she doing here? Tony cursed silently.

The giant looked up at them before raising his other arm to fire a rocket up at the catwalk. Tony protested to no avail. The explosion caused one end of the catwalk to break apart and plummet to the ground. What was left of the catwalk hung down and dangled a good fifty feet from the floor. JC, Darren, and Natalie screamed as the catwalk gave way and they went sliding down. They all nearly fell if weren't for JC grabbing on to a piece of railing, Darren grabbing her legs and Natalie hanging on to Darren. JC let out a shriek of pain as they came to a sudden stop; her right arm was the only thing keeping the three of them from falling to their death.

"No!" Tony yelled and fired one of his repulsors at the giant's face. The giant pulled away, more than likely blinded by the hit, and weakened his grip on Tony just enough for him to escape. "Rhodey," he called out.

"I'm on it," he said as he jetted over to them.

Tony began firing off his repulsors trying to distract the giant long enough for Rhodey to be able to get the three of them on the ground. The giant put his arms up in defense and tried swatting at Tony, but he was faster than the behemoth and easily avoided his flailing arms. Tired of the annoyance, the giant began shooting off rounds from a machine gun attached to one of his arms. Tony hadn't been paying attention to where he was flying and found himself hovering in front of Rhodey and the others. Rhodey already had Darren and Natasha in his hands ready to lower them down, but JC was still dangling. Several rounds ricocheted off the catwalk and startled JC enough to loosen her grip and began falling. Tony shot over and caught her in one arm before coming to an ungraceful landing.

"Are you all right?" he asked when they were both steady on their feet again.

"I'm fine," she winced holding her injured arm. "Go help Rhodey."

Tony was about to turn back to his foe when he was roughly grabbed by his waist and tossed to the other side of the room nearly landing on his head. He looked up ready to fight when he saw the Rhodey had been captured and was now held firmly against a wall by the giant.

"Give up, Stark," the metallic voice said. "And maybe I'll let some of your friends live."

Tony gritted his teeth trying to think up a plan. Rhodey was pinned. JC was injured. Natasha and Darren could do little to nothing against the behemoth. What else could be done? Surrender certainly wasn't an option but neither was getting everyone killed. That was when it dawned on him. At his birthday Rhodey had taken the Mark II and during the fight they had shot at each other with their repulsors which caused an explosion. Their repulsors alone might not make a big enough explosion to affect something of this size but a third might.

"JC, on my mark, fire your repulsors at me and Rhodey. Got it?" he said quietly through the comms.

She darted a look at him but nodded her confirmation.

"Rhodey, birthday party, me and JC," he said. Rhodey gave a small nod and lifted his hands. "Now, JC!"

The three of them fired at once causing a triangle of white energy around the red giant. He looked around for the briefest second probably realizing something bad was about to happen right before the explosion went off. Tony was sent flying from the force and slammed in to a wall. The whole building began to shake as debris began to rain down on them. Thinking on it now in those few seconds before he was buried, Tony thought that maybe two would have been enough in such a small area. Too late now.

* * *

The world went dark. She didn't know for how long. All she knew was that there had been an explosion with bright light and then the whole building seemed to collapse. When the dust had finally settled JC opened her eyes, but it didn't do much good. It was still very dark and she could only see a glimmer of what was probably emergency lighting, if any had survived.

She took stock of her situation trying to figure out which limbs were still able to be moved. Her shoulder felt like it had been ripped from her body the pain was so intense. If it hadn't been pulled from its socket, she was sure the muscle had been torn by the fall. Either way it still hurt like hell. Her other arm was free, so she tried to pull herself out of the debris, but it was no use. One ankle was caught beneath what was left of the catwalk. It didn't feel broken which was probably a good sign. At least she might still be able to walk out. She tried wiggling and pulling, but it was no use. She was firmly caught, and there was no way for her to get herself free.

"Rhodey, Tony," she called out, hoping that the two of them hadn't been trapped to heavily. No answer came. She called again but still there was no answer. Now she was worried. She struggled and pulled some more hoping to get herself free to try to find the others. Darren and Natalie were still in there somewhere too, and they probably weren't doing much better.

"JC, is that you?" she finally heard Rhodey say.

"Yeah, I'm stuck over here," she said and tried moving again if only to help Rhodey find her. Seconds later the metal was pulled off her, and she was able to see better as more light flooded her vision. Any lighting that had been on the ceiling was gone, but most of the lighting that had been on the walls had managed to survive the blast, which was quite impressive. Have you found the others yet?" she asked when she had gotten back on her feet.

"No, not yet," he reported.

JC surveyed the room, at least what was left of it. Metal and pieces of concrete littered the floor burying anything that may have been recognizable as the room that they had been in. She realized now how lucky she had been to have survived. But what had happened to her son and Natalie? And where was Tony? He should have been protected by his armor. He should have been up with Rhodey already.

"Darren, Natalie," she called and began searching through the rubble looking for any signs of movement. There were none. She continued searching one side of the room while Rhodey took the other. She had started pushing around a large piece of debris when something began shifting about twenty feet away from her.

With a swift kick the debris was shot off and Natalie emerged from beneath it with Darren not far behind her. JC stumbled over to them and embraced Darren, more than happy to see him alive.

"Are you both all right?" she asked trying to stay civil towards Natalie. She had tried to help rescue Darren and had probably just saved his life.

"We're fine," Natalie reported. They both shared a look before nodding their appreciation. JC still didn't like her, but she was grateful for what she had done. "Where's Tony?" she asked after a moment.

"I don't know. He should have surfaced already. Tony," JC called out again. There was no reply, not even over the comms.

"JC, over here," Rhodey called. JC turned to see him lifting up a fallen beam, and she caught a glimpse of red.

She released Darren and made her way quickly to him. Why wasn't he standing? Sure, he might have been trapped by the beam, but Rhodey had removed it. So why wasn't he getting up? Was he hurt? It shouldn't have been too bad. His armor was supposed to protect him from something like this. When she finally made it to him, she could see that his entire chest plate was mangled and bent out of shape from where the beam had been laying on him. Now she understood, but why was he still not getting up now?

"Tony?" she said tentatively. Something wasn't right. She grabbed his helmet and after finding the outer releases removed it and put her ear to his mouth to see if he was breathing. Nothing. JC quickly began looking for the releases for his chest plate, but she doubted those would do much good with how damaged it was. Still, it had to come off if she was going to be able to save him. "Tony, stay with me," she urged as she began pulling at the metal. One side began to give way and after several more tugs came loose and she was able to force the mangled piece of metal off his chest. She quickly checked his pulse and finding a very weak one she began doing chest compressions. "Tony, come on, wake up."

She counted off each compression until she reached thirty and gave him two short breaths before starting again. "Damn it, Tony, wake up. You have to start breathing. You have to. Wake up!" She continued another round and checked him again. Still no change. "You son of a bitch," she cursed as she started another, tears beginning to form. "Don't you die on me. Don't you dare leave me now. Get up!" He didn't respond. It took everything she had to keep the tears back, but it was no use. She had no energy left to spare for such a feeble act.

She breathed for him again, and still nothing changed. "Damn you, Tony!" she exclaimed forming a fist and hit his chest. It was no use. There was nothing more she could do. "Don't leave me," she wept. "Don't leave me alone with our children. Please, Tony. I don't know if I can do this alone. Not again. Please, wake up."

Her tears flowed freely now as she collapsed on his chest. This wasn't real. It couldn't be. He was the invincible Iron Man. He was supposed to be protected. And she was supposed to protect him when all else failed. Of all the things that could have possibly happened, of all the dangerous missions he had gone, why did this one have to be the end? All those times he had gone alone he had been just fine, and now this one, the only one he had had help, now he was going to die.

JC felt a hand on her shoulder try to pull her away. She refused to go. She wasn't going to leave him, not like this. The hand pulled again and she looked up at the person it belonged to, ready to snap at them. But it was Darren. His eyes were filled with the same sadness that she was feeling. She knew he had never completely warmed up to the idea of having Tony as a father figure, but he had come to care about the man in a way that she didn't understand, and maybe she never would. That didn't matter now. He was dead. Nothing was going to change that.

"I'm sorry, Mom," he said as he knelt beside her. She covered her face with one hand trying not to let him see her like this, but it was too late for that. Darren wrapped his arms around her, holding her tight. She wanted to return the hug, wanted him to know that she would be all right, but she didn't have the energy, didn't have the will to do so. Her world was crashing around her, and she didn't know what to do except sit there and weep.

She nearly had control of herself when she felt something cold touch her hand that was still lying on his chest.

"Plural?" a weak, raspy voice asked.

JC turned and looked down at Tony. His eyes were slits now, his breathing ragged as he took her hand in his and held it gently.

"Tony?" she said in disbelief. "You're alive!" She wrapped her arms around him and hugged him as tightly as she could manage.

"Gently, gently," Tony strained as he winced. JC released him and looked down at him sheepishly.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you," she apologized as new tears found their way to her eyes. This time she didn't care who saw her cry. These were happy tears. She then promptly gave him a gentle slap.

"Ow! What was that for?" he exclaimed.

"You bastard," she said with a stern glare. "Don't you ever die on me like that again."

A smirk crossed his lips as he gave a small chuckle. "I'm sorry. Next time I'll ask permission."

She smiled a small smile and kissed him. At least he still knew how to lighten the mood.

"What…What did you mean?" Tony asked weakly sounding like he was still trying to catch his breath.

"What are you talking about?"

"You said…children, not Darren," he clarified. "Are you saying that I'm…I mean we're…You're…"

"Yes, Tony," she answered. "I'm pregnant."

Tony shot up faster than JC had thought he was capable of at the moment and kissed her more fervently. She wasn't sure if this was the reaction she had expected. Shock, yes. Complete and immediate joy, not quite. She was sure the timing had something to do with it, but that didn't really matter right now. She was happy, and so was he; and everyone was alive and safe. They were finally reminded of their position when Rhodey began clearing his throat. They both looked over at their three spectators, and JC turned a shade of red.

"Oops," she said. "I forgot about you guys for a second."

"As touching and really weird this moment has been, can we please go home?" Darren said.

JC smiled and nodded. With some help from Rhodey, Tony was up and on his feet again, the broken piece of chest armor in his hands.

"Wait, where's Caleb?" JC asked, finally remembering that her brother was nowhere in sight.

"I'm sure the coward ran as far as he could when the first alarms went off. I tried contacting him just before the fight started, but I got no answer. I doubt we'll ever be seeing him again," Tony answered.

JC nodded and helped walk Tony to a hole that had been made during the explosion. Right now that was their only exit. "Natalie, get Darren outside. We'll be right behind you."

"I can go by myself, Mom. I doubt there's anyone left in the building," he complained.

"Just do as you're told," she said lightly. She had no desire to scold him right now. This was too good of a moment.

He mumbled something under his breath but started walking towards the hole with Natalie about five steps behind him. They were over half way there when a large creaking noise was heard overhead. Darren looked up in time to see more pieces of the ceiling come crashing down. JC watched as he jumped out of the way, stumbling over more debris just in time.

"I'm fine," he said giving a thumbs up.

There was a rustling of more metal as a man emerged from the rubble so quickly and grabbed Darren that none of them could react in time. The man had one arm around Darren's throat and a gun pointed to his head. They all pulled up their weaponry and pointed it at the man.

"Don't move or this bullet goes through his brain," the man threatened. Based on the man's rather beat up appearance, JC could only assume that this man had been the pilot of the other suit. How he had managed to escape the suit without any of them knowing was still boggling.

They all hesitantly lowered their weapons and stared at the man wondering who would make the next move.

"Now, listen here," the man said. "I am leaving with the boy. You will hand over the JARVIS program by 10:00 AM, or I will have the boy killed."

"What are you going to do with it, huh?" Tony asked. "You have no suit for it. You don't even have a facility to store his program anymore. It's over. A.I.M. has nothing more to gain by keeping the boy. Just let him go."

"Fool, the JARVIS was never intended for the suit. A.I.M. is just a means to an end. You have no idea what who or what you're dealing with, Stark. None of you do," the man said with an evil smirk.

"You don't need the boy. Just take me instead. I'm of more use to you than he is," Tony offered.

"Sorry, Stark, it doesn't work like that. Let's go, kid," the man said gruffly and started dragging Darren to the exit. Darren struggled against his grip but kept moving none the less.

"You listen to me," JC said in a low growl. "If you don't let him go right now, I will kill you myself. Do you hear me?"

"You are hardly in any position to make threats. Keep moving, boy. I don't have—"

His words were cut off by the sound of a gunshot. His body went limp and his rolled to the back of his head as the man fell to the ground. They all looked down at the body then around the room for who had done the shooting. Not twenty feet away Caleb was standing, his arm still raised with the gun in his hand, his other hand covering his side which JC could see was bleeding severely.

She quickly rushed to Darren and after making sure he was all right she sent him with Natalie to finally leave the building and went to Caleb. By the time she reached him he was already collapsed on the ground breathing heavily.

"Caleb, what happened?" she asked as she examined his injury. It was a gunshot wound that had left a very significant hole in his abdomen and was still bleeding heavily.

"I ran in to an old coworker of mine. She wasn't too happy that I had the left. I guess that goes against company policy. What do you think?" he said with a weak smile.

"You're just so funny," she said sarcastically. "Come on. We need to get you to a hospital."

"No," he said batting her hands away when she tried to help him up. "There's no time for that. The nearest hospital is over twenty minutes away. I'll be dead by the time we got there."

"Then they'll bring you back. It happens all the time. People die on the table, and they revive them. But we have to leave now," she said and tried again.

"You and I…both know that won't happen," he said weakly.

She did know. She knew from the moment she saw the amount of blood that covered his shirt. She just didn't want to admit it. Despite the fact that she knew he was the scum of the earth he had saved Darren.

"Why did you do it? All of this. You could have just left everything alone, done nothing. Why?" she asked.

He took a shaky breath before answering. "I've done…a lot of things I'm not proud of. I can never take back what I did to you…and if I could go back to change any of it, I would. The fact is…you and that boy…are all I have left. And I'll be damned…if someone else tries to take that away from me."

She stared down at the floor, unsure of what to say at the moment. When she finally looked at him again she said, "I'm grateful for what you did, Caleb; but I'm only human, and I can never forgive for what you did."

He gave a weak chuckle. "You wouldn't be the little sister that I know and love if you did any different."

She gave a small grin as she suppressed the new tears that were forming. "Caleb, no matter what happened, you were," she stopped and corrected herself, "are and always will be my brother. Never forget that."

He looked at her solemnly, understanding what she had meant. For years she had not claimed that he was family, thought of him as dead. This didn't mean she had forgiven him, but it meant something. It meant that she knew the man he was trying become and was now dying trying to fulfill a role he was supposed to have been all those years ago.

"I'll say hi…to Mom and Dad for you. Don't…don't join us too soon, Sis. You've got something good here. Don't let it go."

"I promise," she said as his eyes began to flutter.

"Goodbye…Jaja," he breathed and his eyes closed, his body becoming still.

"Goodbye, Caleb," she said softly. "May you find peace in death." She buried her face in her hands for a moment trying to compose herself. There were so many times that she had thought of killing the man with her own hands, wishing that he suffered the worst possible death. Now that he was dead, she didn't know what to do with these thoughts. Her hatred for him had ebbed, but a part of it was still there. She was sure that it would probably never go away completely, but maybe, just maybe, she could somehow finally move past it and find some way of even forgiving him in some small way.

She was torn from her thoughts by a hand on her shoulder. She looked up to see Tony staring at Caleb's body and then back at her. He offered her a hand which she took and stood, wrapping her arms around him. He held her for a moment before saying quietly, "Let's go home."

She nodded against his chest and followed him out of the rubble to one of the now abandoned trucks outside and left the demolished facility.

* * *

**AN: Almost finished! Just one more chapter after this and then this story will finally be finished. I hope all of you have been enjoying this story as much as the first one. I know it's been taking awhile to get updates, but thanks to all of you who have been so patient and have stayed with it to the end. You guys are awesome! ^_^**


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16**

The next day went by in blur. Tony had brought JC and Darren back to his place for some much needed rest. With his house still in a mess he let JC take the guest bedroom while he and Darren settled for the living room and garage couches. The next morning several S.H.I.E.L.D. agents came by the house including Director Nick Fury to debrief the both of them. Darren was taking JC to the doctor to have her shoulder examined which left Tony to handle Fury by himself.

"Did you know anything about the pilot of the armor?" Fury asked about half way through.

"No, nothing. Except for the part where he was insane and tried killing us all. That and he was spouting something about A.I.M. just being a tool."

"Well, thanks to a lot of digging on Agent Romanoff's part, the pilot's name was Anton Vanko," he said.

Tony looked at him disbelievingly. During JC's camping week he had been going through a case of his father's research. It was this research that had led to his answer to the arc reactor. Among the old blue prints for the reactor he had seen the name of Anton Vanko printed. But he would have had to be an old man. The man who held a gun to Darren's head couldn't have been older than Tony.

"I can see what you're thinking but no, there's no relation between him and the Anton Vanko that helped your father. Based on what Romanoff found, he was telling the truth. The suit they had was perfectly functional without any help from an AI like JARVIS. Anton was there to help oversee the armor project, but based on a journal that was found, he was really working for another organization. There's not much information on the real project he was working on except for the name Ultimo and a few sketchy details. We're still looking for more information," he explained.

"What about the organization that he was really working for? Do we know who it was?"

"Yes, we do."

"Well? Who is it?" Tony asked when Fury didn't provide a name.

"That's not really any of your concern, Stark. You are just a consultant for us."

"Don't you think I'm entitled to some information since whoever it is wants JARVIS and will probably try again? I need to be prepared," Tony reasoned. That was only half true. Honestly, he was just being nosy and hated being left out of the loop. The colonel eyed him for a moment before giving him an answer.

"We've had our eyes on them for some time now. They started out back in the early forties. After the end of World War II they went quiet, but recently we've been getting reports of their activity popping up. They call themselves Hydra. Have you heard of them?"

"It rings a small bell. They were Nazis or something, right? World domination's their ultimate goal or something. Blew up in their faces. What do they want with JARVIS?"

"Like I said, we're not a hundred percent sure yet. If we hear anything that you should know about, you'll hear about it."

Tony didn't like it, but he nodded. He had hoped to get just a little more information from Fury, but he knew that even if Fury did know more than he was saying, Tony wasn't going to get anymore.

"So, how is the boy?" Fury asked after a moment of silence.

"Shook up a bit, but he's doing a lot better than we thought he would be. He's a strong kid," he said.

"Agent Romanoff's report said just as much. What about JC?"

"Well," he started, raking his fingers through his hair, "Darren took her to the hospital this morning. I haven't heard back from them. She acted like she was okay, but that's pretty normal for her. Honestly, I don't really know how she's doing."

Fury looked at him thoughtfully. "Losing a family member can do that to a person. She's tough though. If anyone can pull through this, it's her."

Tony nodded his agreement. "Is there anything else you need?"

"No, we're done here," Fury said as he got up from his seat on the couch. Tony stood from his seat as well and started walking the Colonel to the door.

"By the way," Fury added as he reached the door, "congratulations on the baby. I'm sure you and JC will make good parents."

Tony was about to thank him when he thought for a moment. He hadn't said that she was pregnant. "Wait, how did you…" he trailed off when he realized the only way he would know. "Is there anything Agent Romanoff didn't include in her report?"

Fury smirked. "It's not in the official report, but no. She's quite thorough."

Tony gave him a bemused glare as Fury walked out the door with his agents in tow. He knew something like JC's pregnancy wasn't going to be a secret forever, but that didn't mean he didn't want to be the one to tell everyone the good news.

A few hours later JC and Darren returned from the doctor, JC's arm hanging in a sling.

"Hey, sweetie," he greeted her, kissing her forehead. "So, what did the doctor say?" he asked looking to Darren. He knew that JC would downplay or just lie about it.

"Well, the joint was almost completely dislocated from the socket, but luckily there was minimal tearing to the rotator cuff. The doctor says as long as she takes it easy for at least the next six weeks and keeps the sling at least the next two or three, then she shouldn't have any complications," Darren reported.

"You know, I could have answered myself," JC said with an eye roll.

"Would you have told the truth or said something about the doctor overreacting?" Tony asked.

"I would have given the abbreviated version. Doctor says I'm fine and won't have any long term damage," she said trying to give her most innocent look. He and Darren both gave her a disapproving look. "What?"

"Never mind," Tony conceded. "I'm just happy to hear that everything is going to be fine. Now, what do you say to planning a wedding with Pepper this afternoon?"

"Oh geez, Tony," she sighed. "I thought you were kidding about having it so soon."

"Hardly. What part about not wanting to wait any longer than necessary was not clear? Besides that, I've already ordered your dress," he said with a sly grin.

"You did what?" JC said with her eyes wide in shock. "How did you do that without knowing my size or anything? Wedding dresses aren't just something you call in. You have to be measured exactly so you get a proper fit and everything works out perfectly. And isn't the bride supposed to have some say about the dress, like, I don't know, actually choosing it herself?"

"Would you relax," Tony said with a chuckle. "I called in a very special favor to my good friend Pnina, and she has agreed to make you a one of a kind dress. And she already has your measurements from the last dress I got for you, so that's not a problem."

"Wait a second. Pnina? As in Pnina Tornai?"

"Unless you know another designer by that name," Tony answered.

"Are you serious? No offense, I think she does wonderful work, but a lot her dresses tend to show off a lot more skin than I would like."

"I didn't hear you complaining about the last Pnina dress I gave you," Tony said as he headed for the kitchen.

"What are you talking about? You never gave me a Pnina dress before," she said as she followed him.

"You know that green dress I gave you a couple months ago that you love so much?"

"Yeah, but that's not a Pnina dress. You never said that it was a Pnina dress." Her eyes were narrowed on him now looking like she was considering when to hit him or inflict some other sort of punishment.

"You never asked what designer it was, and I didn't think it was very important to tell you at the time. What difference does it make? I know you like her wedding dresses too. Don't think I haven't caught you drooling when you see them on that TV show of yours," he said as he pulled out a bottle of water from the refrigerator.

"I'll admit that I do admire some of her designs, but none of them are my style and you would know that if you paid any attention to half of the things I wear."

"Would you seriously relax?" Tony said as he walked up to her and put both hands on the counter effectively trapping her. "Pnina knows what you like and has assured me that you will absolutely love it. So would you stop worrying?"

JC let out a heavy sigh before conceding with the closest thing she had to a pout. "Fine," she said. "But if this dress comes back looking slutty, I swear I am not walking down the aisle in it. I would rather go in jeans and a hoodie."

"I would rather you didn't, and I'm sure Pepper will share my opinion on the matter. Now, I am going to leave you here with Pepper, who should be here any minute while I go play downstairs," he said giving her a kiss.

"I hope that means that you are going to clean up that atomic bomb that is still left over from your experimenting. I'm still scared of going down there. I feel like something is going to jump up and bite me."

"I thought you would be a bit more grateful," Tony said with mock insult. "All of that equipment was used to make sure we would actually live to see old age, and now you are complaining about it taking up a little space. I never heard you complaining the other night about the mess."

"Yeah, well, the other night I wasn't exactly in a mood to care. Now, you seriously need to fix that big boom and the rest of the holes in the house if you expect me to come live here with you."

"What about me? Where do I go?" Darren piped in.

"There's always the guest room for now. You're going off to college after this year, so it won't be much of an issue," Tony answered.

"What if I want to go to college locally? What if I want to stay home to save money? You didn't think about that one," Darren pointed out.

"Let's think logically for a second," Tony started. "You are basically the smartest person in your class, and you honestly think you're just gonna go to a community college? And besides that, I am paying for your college, so money is hardly an object. Before I continue further, would you like to change your previous statement?"

Darren's face took the look of the big mouthed frog. Tony wasn't opposed to the idea if Darren wanted to go to a community college, but he knew what the boy was capable. He was good enough to become the next Tony Stark minus the partying and womanizing and weapons development and a number of other things that Tony could think of. He deserved to go to a good college, the best college that money could buy.

"I rest my case. Now, you," he said looking to JC, "are to go sit yourself down on that couch. Pepper will be here any minute."

"And you," JC said as she grabbed Tony's chin hair, "are to get a contractor or someone out here today or tomorrow to get those holes repaired. Understood?"

"Yes, Mother," Tony whined.

"Good boy," she said and gave him a quick peck on the lips. "I'm gonna take Darren home real quick, and then I'll be back to talk with Pepper. Okay?"

"I can take myself home, Mom," Darren complained. "I'm gonna go home, and you can just stay here with Tony and Pepper. I'm sure Tony won't mind bringing you home."

"All right," JC conceded. "Just be careful. The house is still a mess and there's glass everywhere in the living room."

"Yeah, I remember," he said sheepishly. "I'll start cleaning that up as soon as I get there. Anything else?"

JC looked thoughtful for a moment and it looked like she was going to give him another task to do but then decided against it. "Don't bother with clean up. I'll take care of it when I get back. You just go home and head to bed. You still look exhausted."

"I'll be fine, Mom. See ya at home," he said and walked out the door.

"Okay, spill. What else is on your mind?" Tony said as soon as Darren was gone.

"What are you talking about?"

"Don't think I didn't catch that look. What else is bothering you?" Tony repeated.

JC let out a sigh as she took a seat on the couch. "Well, it's something I really needed to ask one of those S.H.I.E.L.D. agents to do. The men who broke in took that man out the back and…well, you know. I needed someone to make sure there wasn't still a body back there rotting in my bushes."

"Don't worry about it. I showed Fury the video tape from your house. He's already got a team down there checking everything out. They should be gone by the time Darren gets back," Tony informed her. That had been a concern of his own, but with everything else that had been going on, it hadn't been a big priority.

"Thanks, Tony. Wait. How did you show him from here?"

"Well, I kinda hacked into your computer from here and downloaded the footage," Tony said with a guilty look on his face. JC gave him a disapproving glare which quickly faded. She looked too tired to argue anything right then. "So did you ever talk to Darren about everything that happened in the past two days?" Tony asked as he took a seat beside her.

"I did," she answered. "He said he had gotten worried over the past three or four weeks with everything that was going on. He had been poking through the mail, and my room, and he found several of the letters that Caleb had sent me. He said he wanted to be prepared and knew I wouldn't have taught him anything. So he snuck off with one of his friends to their martial arts class or something like that. He's definitely smarter than I give him credit for."

"That doesn't surprise me," he said putting an arm around her. "How is he really? Do you think he's going to be okay?"

"He's like me in a lot of ways. He'll be fine. It's just going to take him time. But I don't think he's ever going to get past the fact that a man was killed because he was trying to defend himself. I tried to tell him that it wasn't his fault, but it's no use. I don't know whether it's good or not that he feels so responsible for it."

"He feels something for it. He may never get over it, and maybe that's okay. That's better than the alternative."

"I know," she said as she leaned against him.

"And what about you? How are you really doing? And don't give me the I'm-doing-fine crap."

She gave a small chuckle. She was more than aware of her ways. "I'm not really sure, Tony. I want to say that I'm doing okay, but I really don't know. I never thought about what I would do if I ever saw my brother again. Never considered that I would actually feel remorse for his death. Something about him had changed. I don't like even admitting it, but the old Caleb that I knew would never have given his life to protect another human being."

"People change when given enough incentive, enough drive to do it. Even I'm proof of that. Maybe he finally learned what it really means to need family."

"Maybe," she agreed hesitantly. "I guess we'll never know now."

Tony leaned over and kissed her hair giving her a reassuring hug. "Will you be all right?"

"Time heals all wounds right?" she said looking up at him with a small smile.

"That's the rumor," he quipped.

"Then I'm going to be just fine. I just need time."

"Okay," Tony said and gave her a quick kiss. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have people to call, junk to clean, maybe some stuff to blow up. See you in a couple hours," Tony said as he flashed JC a smirk and ran downstairs to his basement before JC had a chance to yell or give him another glare.

* * *

Two weeks passed quicker than Tony had expected. Before he knew it, everyone was back on that same beach Tony had brought JC and Darren too all those months ago: Pepper, Happy, Rhodey, Darren, JC and a minister who had been paid a considerable amount to stay quiet.

A rose petal aisle had been laid out leading up to a very simple wedding arch which was decorated with only a white sheer fabric. It was all very minimal, but it was elegant and tasteful.

Tony stood nervously in his spot at the arch. He would have thought by now that he would have learned to not be so nervous when it came to doing anything with JC. Of all the awkward conversations he'd had with her, proposing to her, everything they had been through he still found himself nearly breaking into a sweat. Part of him kept telling himself that this was normal. He was getting married for pity's sake. He was tying the knot, putting on the ball and chain and signing away his bachelor life forever. Well, that wasn't exactly what it felt like. It wasn't so much of a burden as it was a relief. After today there would never be another woman he would love more, cherish more than JC, and the world was going to know it. Tony was more than okay with that.

Besides this, there was another part of him saying that he was always going to feel like that around her. She was the one special person in his life that made him feel like he could do anything, be anything for her. He had thought for years that Pepper would be that woman, but Fate had other plans. Pepper was an incredible woman in her own right, but she just wasn't the same. He just couldn't put it all into words. All he could think was that this was how it should be: perfect.

Rhodey stood beside him as his best man with Happy standing right behind him. Pepper stood on the opposite side as JC's maid of honor. With no other girl friends, JC wasn't left many options for that role, but she and Pepper were very close friends, and JC had said she couldn't see anyone else filling that role better.

Tony started doing a mental check of himself. He fixed his bowtie, checked his cummerbund, and started checking his pockets for JC's ring. When he couldn't find it he began searching more fervently until Rhodey put his hand on his shoulder.

"I've got you covered," he said with a smile and showed Tony the ring box.

Tony sighed in relief. "Thanks, buddy. You're a lifesaver."

Rhodey smiled back at him and pocketed the ring box. Tony wasn't sure what he'd do without Rhodey. Probably crash and burn at about half of his ventures. He was happy today more than ever that he was at his side.

The violinist Tony had hired began to play Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring which brought everyone to attention. Moments later JC began walking down the beach with Darren by her side. As they started down the petal aisle Tony couldn't help but be breath taken by her appearance. She was always stunning in any formal wear, but this dress definitely took the cake. The A-line chiffon skirt led up to a corseted top with a sweet heart neckline and chiffon shoulder straps. The veil seemed to just tie it all together giving her an ethereal look that he had never seen on her before. Tony imagined that if he were a more emotional man he would have probably cried for how beautiful she looked. She truly was his angel today.

When she made it to the end of the aisle Darren gave her a hug and handed her to Tony before taking his place by Happy. JC handed her bouquet over to Pepper and took Tony's hands in hers. The minister started rambling on with the usual speech about marriage, how it wasn't to be taken lightly, how love was patient and kind and everything else that Tony had seen and heard a dozen times in movies. He was hardly paying any attention. How could anyone with the kind of distraction he had? It wasn't until the minister asked for them to say their vows that Tony finally came out of his trance.

"JC," he began, "from the moment we met we have been butting heads. I was stubborn in my ways and thought that I knew what was best for me. You opened my eyes and showed me that I could be more than what I was. Your necessary roughness, your kindness, your courage, your unwavering loyalty to your friends and your family have never ceased to amaze me. You are the only one that I can ever see myself being with for the rest of my days. I can only promise to love you and try to live to be the man that I know you have shown me I can be."

JC smiled and stifled a giggle at his vow before beginning hers.

"Tony, from the moment we met I knew you could not be the one. You were arrogant, stubborn, pig-headed, and a multitude of other things that could never amount to be anything good. But you showed me that there was more to you than that. Your bravery, your compassion, your drive to do good in the world has proven to me that there is no other man on this earth that I would rather be with today than you. I promise to be faithful to you and love for the rest of my days."

The minister continued on with his speech until they said their I-dos. They exchanged their rings, and finally the end of the ceremony came. Tony lifted her veil and looked down into her crystal blue eyes and was speechless all over again. She was even more beautiful than he had thought was even possible. The minister finally said, "You may kiss the bride," and Tony wasted no time in doing just that. The few witnesses that were gathered began cheering as Tony held her locked in his embrace wishing that this perfect moment would never end. They were finally together forever and nothing was ever going to tear them apart.

* * *

**AN: Okay, so this isn't going to be last chapter. I was going to add in the last part, but when I looked at it, it was way too long, so I'm breaking it up in to two parts. It's almost finished, so the last chapter should be up in a few days. Just to clear this up for anyone who doesn't know or didn't guess it already, the big bad guy of the story was the Crimson Dynamo. If there's anyone who knows their comic book stuff, sorry, but I did play around with Dynamo's background a little bit. Also, the first Crimson Dynamo's name actually is Anton Vanko and there really is no relation to the Vanko from the movie. that character is a mix of Whiplash and Dynamo in case anybody was wondering. I was a good little writer and did my research. So leave me a review. I love hearing what you guys have to say, and I'm so sad this story is coming to an end! i thought about doing a third, but I'm pretty sure everyone is bored with this story now and is ready to move on to bigger and better things. I also thought about adding an extra chapter with some of the behind the scenes stuff with what was happening with Caleb while everyone else was off fighting Dynamo. Let me know if anyone would be interested in reading something like that. Otherwise, it's been fun while it lasted. Hope to hear from you guys soon ^_^**


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17**

Tony stretched out in his bed feeling the first bit of freedom he'd had in over eight months. But this wasn't right. Where was the extra body that was supposed to be filling the space? He looked around groggily but only found JC's body pillow laying haphazardly off the edge of the bed. He sat up and rubbed the sleep from his eyes and examined the room as best as he could in the dark. No JC. He looked to the clock to see it glowing a red 1:30 AM. He groaned and was about to lay down to go back to sleep with the assumption that JC was in the bathroom when he heard what sounded like a cross between a scream and a groan and crying.

It took him a moment to realize that the sound was coming from down the hall possibly even downstairs. When he heard the noise again he realized that it was JC, and there was a chance that noise meant she was going into labor.

Tony stumbled out of the bed and bolted out the door to look for his pregnant wife. As he headed down the hall Darren came stumbling out as well with the same look on his face that Tony was sure was on his face. They heard the noise again and both of them bolted down the stairs trying not trip in their tiredness. When they made it down they saw JC in the kitchen with her head leaned against the refrigerator and a pathetic look on her face.

"Honey, are you okay?" Tony asked quickly.

She shook her head silently.

"Are you going into labor?"

Again she shook her head. Now Tony was confused.

"Then what's wrong? We heard you crying."

She looked over at him with a pouty face and whined, "There's no more pudding and pickles."

Tony and Darren looked at each other with incredulous stares before turning their stares on JC. JC had acquired a few very odd cravings during her pregnancy, the pickles and tapioca pudding possibly being the strangest, and she was known to get whiney when she didn't get it when she wanted it, but this was a bit extreme.

"Darren, go back to bed. I'll take care of this."

"Thanks, Tony," Darren mumbled and dragged himself back up the stairs.

"Honey, why don't you come back to bed? I promise to make sure the fridge is well stocked in the morning," Tony said as he took JC by the shoulders and tried to gently lead her back to their bedroom.

"I know. I'm a bitch. You can say it," she pouted.

"No, sweetie, you're not a bitch. What makes you say that?" Tony said in the most soothing voice he could manage.

"I woke you guys up. I didn't mean to. I just woke up and was really hungry. I'm sorry," she moped as she started waddling slowly towards the stairs.

"It's all right, honey. We understand. You're eating for two, and the little guy just has odd eating hours. It's fine," Tony muttered as he followed. "Let's just go back to bed, okay?"

"I feel like a fricking cow and eat like a pig," she whined even more pathetically as she stopped in her tracks and stood in the middle of the living room.

Tony stifled the urge to groan at her. He had done all the reading about pregnant women and their hormones well in advance. He had thought that since she'd already been through one pregnancy she would know how to keep them in check at least a little bit. The past four months had been fairly similar, and he was just wishing now that it would end. It was these moments that made him thankful that he would never have to be pregnant. This was a nightmare.

"You do not look like a cow and you hardly eat like a pig," Tony said forcing her to turn and look at him. "You are gorgeous, and we are going to look back on this and laugh at how ridiculous we both were. And I'm sure you are going to be very grossed out by some of your food choices. Now can we please go back to bed?"

She gave a small nod and after kissing her forehead Tony grabbed her by the hand and started leading her back to the stairs.

"You know I had weird cravings with Darren, too. Chocolate covered onion rings were my favorite then," she mumbled.

"That's…weird, honey." He thought about saying something else so she wouldn't feel bad, but next to the pudding and pickles he wasn't sure which was stranger or more disgusting.

She suddenly pulled away from him and inhaled sharply, one hand going to her enlarged stomach.

"What's wrong?"

"It's nothing," she said waving him off. "The baby's just kicking again." She took in another sharp breath and her face contorted in pain.

Tony came down several steps to her side and felt his foot step in something wet. "Who spilled water?" he asked absent mindedly.

JC looked down at where he was staring and looked back at him with a wide eyed stare. "Oh, God, Tony. I'm going into labor."

It took Tony a half second longer than it should have for him to process what she had just said. Her water had just broken. They were about to have a baby.

"Darren!" he called back up stairs. Darren came running out quickly to see what the fuss was now. "Get your mom's suitcase and toss me my shoes quick! She's gone into labor," Tony said quickly and ran to the garage to pull the car around to front door so JC didn't' have to go down the stairs.

When he came bursting through the front door Darren was ready with the small duffel bag and Tony's shoes. Tony shoved both shoes on quickly before taking JC in his arms and started carrying her out the door.

"JARVIS, call the doctor. Let him know we're coming in right now," he ordered before he walked out the door. With JC and Darren in the back seat of JC's SUV Tony hit the gas pedal and started speeding toward the hospital.

The advantage of having to drive this early in the morning was that there was a lot less traffic to have to fight on the way there. That also meant a cop could easily catch him for speeding if they really wanted to. Tony only hoped that there weren't any on the route to the hospital. As he weaved through the traffic that was present he pulled out his cell phone and hit the speed dial for Rhodey.

While the phone was ringing on the other end JC had started moaning in pain. "Tony, hurry up. I think it's gonna come a lot faster than last time," managed.

"Whoa, hang on. We are not delivering a baby in this car. I don't know how to deliver a baby. Darren doesn't know how to deliver a baby. You've gotta hold it 'til we get to the hospital," Tony urged. In the back of his mind he was kicking himself. He was sure he sounded like an ass for saying it.

"Tony? What the hell is going on?" a groggy Rhodey asked from the other end. Tony hadn't noticed that he had answered the phone.

"Hi, Rhodey," Tony said automatically composing himself for the moment. "In case you haven't guessed we're on our way to the hospital. JC just went into labor about ten minutes ago."

"Are you serious?" Rhodey exclaimed. "Did you call Pepper yet?"

"No, I haven't called Pepper yet. Does it sound like I've had time to call Pepper? Would you just meet us at the hospital and bring an extra set of clothes. I kinda need them."

"Okay, I'm on it. You take care of JC. I'll call Pepper. She should be with Happy," Rhodey said.

"Okay, perfect. Wait. Why would she be with Happy at this hour?"

"Really, Tony? Have you been under a rock or something? Never mind. I'll talk to you when I get to the hospital," Rhodey said and hung up.

Tony stared at his phone for a moment feeling completely dumbstruck. Were Pepper and Happy a couple now? When did that happen? Maybe he had been living under a rock. He'd hardly paid any attention to the two over the past several months what with JC's pregnancy and everything else that had been going on. He really needed to catch up on his current events.

Another cry from JC pulled him from his thoughts and back to the road. "Tony, something's wrong. I can feel it. Can't you go any faster?"

"I'm going as fast as I can without getting pulled over. We're almost there, sweetie. Everything's gonna be okay." Tony stepped on the gas a little harder not caring now if a cop caught him or not. His wife needed help and she needed it now.

A minute later Tony pulled into the hospital parking lot and came to an abrupt stop in front of the door that was marked Delivery by the Emergency entrance. Tony made his way to the back seat and helped JC out of the car and carried her to the door. Several nurses were waiting by the front desk with a wheelchair standing by.

"Mr. Stark, we need you wife to take a seat here. We'll take care of her from here," one of the nurses, a woman dressed in pink scrubs said as she motioned to the wheelchair.

JC let out another scream and said, "Oh, hell no, lady. I don't need a damn wheelchair. This kid is coming out sooner than that."

Tony looked to the nurse not quite sure what to do. He had seen this part in movies enough times. The woman was supposed to go in the wheelchair and a couple hours later out came the kid. But this wasn't a movie. The mothers in the movies weren't usually screaming in this much pain until they were actually pushing the baby.

"Can I get a gurney," the nurse called out and several more male nurses pulled up a gurney. Tony laid JC out on the gurney and she proceed to curl up into a fetal position.

"Let's get her to a room stat," the nurse said and the two men started pushing the gurney through a pair of double doors back to where Tony could only assume was the delivery room. "When did she start going into labor?" the nurse asked as they wheeled JC down the hall.

"About twenty minutes ago. We got here as soon as we could," he answered.

"About how far apart are her contractions?"

"Uh…I don't know. I wasn't exactly keeping track of that," Tony said dumbly.

They turned a corner and pushed her into an empty room, JC's doctor finally appearing from nowhere.

"What do we have?" the doctor asked.

"She went into labor approximately twenty minutes ago. We have no idea how far apart the contractions are," the nurse reported.

"JC, how do you feel? How often are the contractions coming?" the doctor asked her.

"I don't know. Maybe three minutes apart. The pain hasn't stopped. Something's wrong, Doc. I'm telling you. It doesn't feel the same as last time," she moaned.

"Okay, JC, we're going to take a look at you now. Nurse," the doctor said and had JC's pajama pants removed and started inspecting her.

Tony had to admit he didn't feel completely comfortable with another man looking at his wife like that, but this was supposed to be normal. He was a doctor. He was there to help her. Tony kept that in mind as he watched the doctor put his hands between her legs.

"It looks like we have a breach. Nurse, have the OR prepped in case we need to do an emergency cesarean," the doctor ordered and one of the male nurses left to do as told.

"What does that mean? What do you mean a breach? Is that bad? What's going on?" Tony asked questions a mile a minute. What was happening to her? Why were they considering surgery? The doctor never said anything about this during any of their appointments. He said everything looked normal. What did this breach mean?

"Mr. Stark, I'm going to have to ask you to leave now. I will let you know when I can," the doctor said and pointed him out the door.

"No, I'm not going to leave my wife. What the hell is going?" now he was mad. He didn't like being kept out of the loop. What was going to happen to JC?

"Mr. Stark, the baby is breaching. We need to get the child out now or we may lose him. Please, leave," he ordered more sternly and started pushing him toward the door.

"I'm not leaving my wife or child," Tony argued more fervently and started resisting the doctor.

"Nurse," the doctor called and the nurse picked up the telephone in the room and his voice could be heard over the intercom calling a Code Strong. Tony wasn't sure what that was, but he was sure it meant that they were going to take him away from JC. He wasn't going to let that happen.

"Tony, please, let the doctor do his work," Darren urged as he grabbed Tony's arm and tried pulling him away.

"I am not leaving," Tony said pushing him aside. Moments later four burly looking men showed up and started to drag Tony away from the room. That sent him over the edge. How dare they try to take him away when his wife needed him most. He struggled and fought with all his might against the men. He wasn't about to go down without a fight. They managed to get Tony out into the hall and were about to take him down the hall, but Tony was too strong for them. He was shouting now, kicking and flailing his arms against the men. He couldn't just leave her. She needed him. His child was in danger. Couldn't they understand that?

Moments later Tony felt something sharp poke his neck and he began to slowly lose control of his muscles. He tried force his arms and legs to move against the other men, but it was no use. Black started to cloud his vision until it enveloped him, and he knew no more.

* * *

When Tony's vision finally started to clear up he could see that he was no longer in the hallway where he had started. He was slumped over in a chair in what looked to be a waiting room with Darren, Rhodey, Pepper, and Happy all surrounding him.

"How are you feeling, man?" Rhodey said as he handed him a paper cup with water in it.

"Like I just got my ass kicked," he groaned as he rubbed the back of his neck trying to get rid of the soreness. He took the cup that Rhodey handed him and swallowed it down in two large gulps. "What happened?"

"You were being jackass," Pepper answered.

Tony just glared at her. He already knew that part.

"A nurse had to give you a sedative. You've been down for a couple hours. You sure you're feel okay?" Rhodey asked again.

"I'm fine. A couple hours? Where's JC? Is she okay? What about the baby?" Tony asked remembering why he'd been given a sedative.

"The kids are doing fine. JC is still in recovery. There were a few complications, but the doctor said she's going to be just fine," Rhodey answered.

"I want to see her. I need to see for myself," Tony said urgently as he propped himself up.

"They won't let you, Tony. Not right now. She needs rest right now. The doctor will let you know as soon as possible, okay?"

Tony didn't like it, but he conceded. He didn't feel like getting another sedative. "But the kid is fine?" he asked.

"Both kids are fine," Rhodey repeated.

"What do you mean 'kids'? I don't care about Darren. I know he's fine. He's right there," Tony said pointing over to Darren who was staring at the rest of them.

"No, Tony, you're not listening. Both of your children are fine. JC had twins," Rhodey clarified.

Tony was dumbfounded. Twins? He hadn't seen that one coming. "What do you mean 'twins'? There's some kind of mistake. We never saw twins on any of the sonograms. Are you sure it was twins?"

"I'm sure, Tony," Rhodey said with a smile. "The doctor said it's not uncommon for one kid to hide behind the other. This kind of thing doesn't happen often, but it does."

"But what about the heartbeat? Wouldn't the doc see or hear a second heart?"

"The doctor said the heartbeat sounded strange for a single child, but there was nothing on the sonogram to indicate any serious complication with the child. You don't sound very excited, Tony," Rhodey said with an odd look on his face.

"No, no I'm very happy. I just…I just didn't expect twins. I'm a father," he breathed. "I can't believe I'm really a father now." A broad smile found its way to Tony's face and stuck to him.

"Congratulations, sir," Happy said. Pepper and Rhodey both gave him their congratulations giving him hugs and such.

"Hey, would the new dad like to see his kids?" Darren asked as he stood from his seat.

Tony looked at him still reeling from the shock. It all still seemed so surreal. He was father. He had two kids. He hadn't expected this, wasn't sure if this was what he had wanted, but hearing that his children were in the world and healthy seemed to just make all his fears melt away for the moment. He gave a small nod and stood from his seat to follow Darren.

Darren led him down a hallway to a large pane of glass and pointed at two children sleeping side by side in the first row of kids. One was wrapped up in a pink blanket, the other a blue.

"Boy and girl?" he asked. Darren nodded and Tony looked back to the two beautiful babies. The girl had a head full of almost jet black hair and the boy was toe head. Tony was a bit surprised that they looked so different. He would have thought they would have been a little more similar just because they were twins, but he thought that maybe because they were fraternal that it didn't really apply. He didn't really care at that moment. They were healthy, beautiful and his.

"Tony, are you crying?" Darren asked as he put a hand on his shoulder.

Tony put one hand to his face and realized he was indeed crying. He smiled and let out a small laugh. "I guess I am. I'm just so happy. I don't think I've ever been this happy before," he said looking to Darren who was also smiling.

"You realize though that this means you're going to have to redo the nursery, right?" Darren noted.

Tony thought about it for a moment. They had added an extra room on to the house for nursery, but they had only been expecting one kid. Tony hoped that it was big enough to fit another crib in since there really wasn't time to add extra room to it. Thankfully they hadn't decorated the room in gender specific colors. They had wanted to be surprised, and, well, they were to say the least.

"I guess Pepper will be going on another shopping trip today," Tony mused.

"Why don't we all go together? The doc isn't going to let us see Mom for awhile, and there's no point in us waiting around here twiddling our thumbs. What do you say?"

Tony knew he could use a good distraction, but he also didn't want to leave the kids. He hadn't even gotten to hold them yet. He debated the issue for another minute before yielding to Darren's logic.

Several hours later after looking at five different cribs and trying to decide which one was safest and didn't clash with the décor they got the crib back to the house and assembled it in the nursery. It was tight fit, but it was acceptable for now. Eventually they would build on to the room for when the kids got bigger. Hopefully by then Darren would be moved out so they could each have their own room. That was the only downside of having kids of the opposite sex; you couldn't stick them in the same room for very long.

After finishing their little adventure they all headed back to the hospital to check on JC. She was still sleeping when they returned, but the doctor had said that it was all right for her to have visitors. Not wanting to be a burden, Rhodey, Pepper and Happy all left the hospital and agreed to come visit after JC was able to come home.

Tony stood in JC's room with a cup of mediocre coffee from the hospital cafeteria and stared out the window. Already the paparazzi had gotten wind of the delivery and were massing outside hoping to snap a picture of the baby. That was one thing Tony did enjoy about hospitals. It was the one place where the media couldn't get to them. His only worry was when it came time for them to go home. He didn't really feel like trying to wade through a sea of reporters and photographers with two kids and an exhausted wife. Maybe they could slip out at night when they all got tired. He doubted all of them would give up that easily, but at least there wouldn't be quite so many.

It reminded him of the day that they had found out about their marriage. The media had field day with that. They were headline news for over a week with everyone wanting the big story of how they had fallen in love, why it had all been a big secret, and how they had managed to hide it so well. In short, Tony had told them that his personal life was none of their business and had no comment about anything else they wanted to know. Needless to say, they weren't very happy about it, but they eventually let it go until they found out about the pregnancy. That was another rollercoaster all together.

Tony was torn from his thoughts by the sound of movement from JC's bed. He turned to see her eyes peering groggily around the room probably looking for something familiar.

"Hey, beautiful," Tony said as he set down his coffee and took the seat next to her. She smiled up at him as he leaned over her and began stroking her forehead with his thumb. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I just had a parasite cut out of me," she said tiredly.

Tony smirked. "That's a bit rude to call your kids parasites."

"You don't ever have to go through the feeling of having something growing inside and essentially feeding off you for nearly nine months. I felt the same way with Darren that I did with this guy. Was it a boy or a girl?" she finally asked.

"Both," Tony answered with a smile.

"Oh God, we have a kid with boy and girl parts?" JC groaned.

Tony laughed. That wasn't exactly the conclusion he would have come up with for that statement, but maybe it had something to do with the fact that she was still on painkillers. "No, honey, we have one boy and one girl, and they are the most beautiful children I have ever seen."

She looked at him confused for a moment as she let the information soak in. When it finally dawned on her that she'd had twins, confusion was replaced by surprise. "Huh," she said. "I wonder how that happened. The doctor never said anything like that. That's definitely unexpected. What do we do about the nursery?"

"That's already been taken care of. Pepper chose out a new crib and extra carrier and everything else baby that we could ever need. We are all set to be parents," Tony said with a smile.

JC gave him a small smile in return and took his hand in hers. "I missed you," she said quietly.

"I missed you, too," he replied and kissed her forehead.

The moment was almost perfect until Darren barged into the room.

"Hey, guys," he greeted quietly trying to be polite.

JC rolled over and gave him a weak hello and Tony looked up at him waiting for him to say whatever it was he had come to say.

"The nurse said the babies can be brought in, if you guys wanted to see them," he said.

"Tell her we'd love to see them," JC answered and pushed herself up into a sitting position.

Darren left the room to go tell the nurse and JC patted the empty half of her bed. "Come here," she beckoned.

Tony didn't need a second invitation and hopped into the bed with her ready to accept the children when they came. Several minutes later the nurse and Darren came in with both kids. JC was given the boy and Tony took the girl. After they had finished cooing over the sleeping infants Darren asked the nurse if she could take a picture of them all together. She agreed and after Darren took his position next to Tony they all smiled and watched the camera flash. After that they were left to have a few minutes alone as a family.

"So what are you guys gonna name them?" Darren asked.

"Well, we did some thinking about it, and after looking on about a hundred different sites trying to come up with something good for a boy or girl, and I guess we get to use both now. Her name is Kara Daina, and he is going to be Kar Matas," Tony answered.

"What's with the funny middle names?" Darren asked.

"Well," JC started, "my mother would have wanted them to have good Lithuanian names, so their middle names are Lithuanian. I tried to go with something that was quite as horrible as mine. They sound good don't you think?"

"They're definitely better than yours, Mom. Both of your names are odd," Darren said as he moved closer to get a better look at his new siblings.

"Thank you, Son, for that oh so loving comment," JC said sarcastically.

"Hey, I call 'em as I see 'em," he said as he ignored JC's glare.

"Kara," Tony cooed. "I don't know how long you're going to have a big brother since it sounds like your mommy is about two seconds away from beating him up."

JC turned her glare on Tony who held up the baby as a shield."Aren't we just a big happy family," JC mused.

"Yeah," Tony agreed absentmindedly as he stared at both of his children then his wife. "We are now," he said and kissed JC. One big happy family.

**THE END**

* * *

**AN: Yay for a happy ending! And a quick one at that. I think this is the fastest update ever for me. Well, I hope everyone who stuck around for the end enjoyed it all. I've had a blast writing it, and it wasn't as horrible of a sequal as I thought it might be. As I said before, I've considered turning it into a trilogy, but after looking at the popularity of this compared to the first, I doubt a third one would survive. **

**Thanks to everyone who have been reading and leaving those wonderful reviews for the past year. It's been a long journey once again, but I think it was fairly well worth it. I guess I should move on now to my other stories that I have been neglecting for so long. If ya'll get a chance and you like my writing, feel free to check out my other stories. They're a bit older and could probably use a little updating, but they're decent enough. See ya'll later ^_^**


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